Legends Don't Die
by Drawingdragons24-7
Summary: Sealed away for protection, X wakes up a hundred years in the future and yet still is a major technological leap above the current time. He struggles to find his own place in the world as it slowly crumbles into chaos. (I am planning to start from the very beginning of Megaman X to the very end of Megman Zero. Yeah, I know this has been done before, but this one is different.)
1. Awareness

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Megaman X or its characters.

 _"_ _Life isn't about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself."-George Bernard Shaw_

Awareness was the first thing that hit him. The feeling of being _alive_. Or as far as being alive for him went. His systems told him that he wasn't human.

The awareness was followed by the sound of an elderly voice but a status report that blared to life in his field of vision momentarily distracted him from responding to the sound. The report told him that he hadn't been completed yet, but somehow he didn't seem to mind. He was alive right? That's all that mattered at the moment.

"X?"

The voice repeated itself and he opened his eyes, his optics adjusting to the lighting in the room. He turned his head slightly to see an elderly white haired man with a large beard. He wore a white lab coat that bulged in the middle to cover his large belly. The man smiled down at him.

"Who are you?" he asked, for the first time using his voice.

"I am Thomas Light. I created you, X," the old man said. A wave of understanding passed over him, but it was soon followed by curiosity.

"X? You called me X. . . Is that my name?" he asked, unsure.

"That's right," Light assured him. "It's a variable. It represents limitless potential. You see, you are a new type of robot that can think for himself. An android."

"New type? You mean other robots can't?" X asked.

"No, in this time they are restricted. You however are not, and are free to be yourself. It is my dream that mankind can learn to accept robots as equals and you, X, can achieve that. You are designed to think, act, and feel exactly like a human. You have free will," Light explained. "There were, however, a few that came close to having free will despite their programing. I am sorry to say though that you will not be seeing them any time soon."

"Are they okay?" X asked, worried. Light smiled.

"Yes, yes. They are fine. It's just that they are sleeping now and will not awaken while you are being built. Perhaps for even much longer after that as well."

"Oh," X said, a bit disappointed.

The next few hours, X talked with Light as the old scientist explained the world X was brought into, tolerating X's near constant questions as he worked on finishing X's body. Soon though, X had to shut down as Light now needed to work on more technical and electrical parts and keeping X awake would risk damaging him severely.

X had been activated several times after that. During which, he learned more about the world, which only strengthened a burning desire to see the world for himself.

The next time his systems blared to life, the status reports told him that he was nearly complete. He opened his eyes and turned once more to see . However, there was something off about the old scientist.

"What's the matter, Doctor? You look tired," X asked, concerned. Light smiled.

"You truly are just like us humans, X," Light commented. He paused and coughed. "That's why I'm afraid that mankind is not quite ready to accept you." X looked at him in shock. "You are not yet mature. They might very well view your limitless evolutionary potential as something to be feared. The name X also carries connotations of danger."

The world may not want him? That greatly saddened X and he shut himself down so he could spend some time to think it over.

Later, though, when he reactivated, he came to an agreement of sorts with the fact that mankind may not accept him. He would give mankind no reason to fear him. He would be gentle. He would not fight unless it was necessary. It was at that moment that he determined that fighting was wrong.

It was a while before X was completed. slowed down greatly as he built X. His old age had caught up to him and he found it difficult to keep moving.

X awoke happily when he saw that he had been completed. But when he opened his eyes to see he instantly grew serious when he saw the scientist's expression.

"I'm sorry X," Light apologized. "I didn't have enough time to see you enter the world."

Light paused as he coughed.

" !" X exclaimed in worry. Light's condition was obviously worsening. To hear him speak as he did worried X.

"I've given you the power to think, to worry, and to grow and evolve as you fight, but it is too soon for that power to be unleashed."

"Doctor. I'll use this power to fight for justice. To fight for hope!" X exclaimed as he looked at his right arm which was currently morphed into a buster. _"_ _But only if I have no other choice,_ " he added in his head.

"Of course you will. I believe it to be so. X, I want you to use that conscience of yours to fight for the people of the future." Light reached down to press a few buttons on the control panel of the pod X was currently in and the pod slowly began sealing. "They will need someone like you to guide them."

"Doctor," X said, unable to say more as his emotions threatened to reveal themselves as he realized what was happening.

"Farewell X, you are the world's one true hope."

X stared into Light's smiling face as his systems slowly shut down and his eyes closed.

They would not reopen for nearly a century.

A century later . . .

From the journal of , archeologist

 _April 8th_

 _Still nothing. For the last month, I have been sifting through the dirt trying to find a fossil record which would verify my findings on Mesozoic plant life, but so far I have come up empty. Tomorrow, I'll move my archaeological dig to a new site. Maybe I'll have better luck._

 _April 9th_

 _Set up camp at the new site and laid out a preliminary gridwork for the dig. I got some odd readings at location E-46. It looks like something metallic is buried several meters below the surface. I think I'll begin there tomorrow_

Small pebbles and dust clattered onto the dusty stone floor as part of the rocky ceiling above began to give away to an unseen force. There was the sound of metal striking rock as a small part of the ceiling finally collapsed. A rope dropped down from the hole and curled onto the floor with a light thud.

A man far too old to be doing any sort of strenuous work emerged from the hole and slid down the rope with a grunt. He was mostly bald with a thick matted beard hanging from his chin. He was currently wearing a brown leather jacket that was covered in pockets. Brown pants and thick, waterproof hiking boots protected his lower half from mud, thorns, sticks, and in this case, rock. Over all his appearance made him look like an explorer as a brown hat typically associated with people going through the jungle, was hanging from a rope around his neck.

The hole in the ceiling lit up some of the opening he had dropped into, but not very much. He could not see much more than five feet in front of him. Not wanting to risk tripping on something or falling to his death in a deep hole, the old man took out a flashlight that was hooked onto his belt, fumbling with the latch a bit, for his old age had taken away some of his hand coordination skills.

A rocky hallway was revealed before him as he turned the flashlight on. He pulled a small device from one of his many pockets and stared down at it for a second before looking ahead. The device seemed to be some sort of GPS or tracking device as he began walking forward, not really having to be careful where he stepped as the stone floor was worn smooth by an unknown force years before. He kept on checking the small device in his hands, making sure he was going towards the intended destination.

As he walked farther along, the opening proved to be a sort of hallway, but it soon came to an end and he gasped. There was a metal door built into the stone before him.

"Is this the metallic reading I've been getting?" the old man mumbled to himself. He reached out to turn the metal handle. "I wonder what's inside. Not another dead end I hope."

He opened the metal door with a grunt for the hinges had grown slightly rusty over the years. He gasped as his flashlight revealed a room inside.

It was the remains of an old lab, that had been damaged far before he had opened the rusty old door. Sifting through the remains of the lab, he found a few old papers. Based on the information the papers contained and the technology that was around him, he came to the conclusion that the lab he was currently standing in belonged to none other than the famous robot designer, Dr. Thomas Light. . . .

 _April 10th_

 _I can't believe what I found! Several meters below the surface was the remains of a lab. Although most of the lab was damaged, I did manage to find papers that indicate that it belonged to the famous robot designer, Dr. Thomas Light. I've begun to review what is left of Dr. Light's notes and it looks like he was onto a major breakthrough. The notes keep referring to "the capsule"..._

 _April 13th_

 _I found it. Standing 14 meters high and 8 meters wide, the capsule was hidden underneath a collapsed ceiling. Even underneath all the rubble, the capsule has remained intact and was still running some sort of diagnostic when I found it. There is a warning on the capsule, but all the indicators on the capsule show green. It should be safe to open it. I'll know tomorrow._

 _April 14th_

 _Today I met "X." Not simply a robot, X is something totally different. Light has given him the ability to think and make his own decisions. At times, X seems more like a man than like a machine._

This was the second time that awareness filled his systems in such a drawn out way. He felt as though he had been asleep for a long time. Something told him that he had. He woke slowly, not sure how ready he was for the new world. was dead and he knew so. The pod had been testing him for quite some time now. It schooled him on the ways of the world around him and tested his abilities in various fields. It tested his fighting abilities, but he refused to do many of them. He wasn't planning on fighting anyways. The tests that he enjoyed were the communications tests. The ones that showed him how truly human he was.

By the time he opened his eyes, he had already been activated for a few minutes. His green eyes adjusted to the lighting in the dusty and dark room and soon an old man, who looked quite different than came into view before him. The man stared at him in wonder and awe, taking in X's mostly blue armor. X sensed a bit of fear in the old man when he awakened, but the fear immediately disappeared when the old man stared at X's eyes. X clenched his hands briefly, letting his systems scan his body for any possible errors, as his eyes wandered around what appeared to be the remains of a lab and many fallen rocks. The pieces of the puzzle fell into place and X knew he had been asleep for far more than the thirty year minimum the pod had required. He sat up in the pod and shook his head, trying to clear his systems of the persistent grogginess that flowed through him.

"Hello?" X said unsure as the man before him had been staring for a while; the only movement the old man had performed was blinking. The man shook his head as if relieving himself from shock and smiled at X as the android got out of the pod and stood, stretching.

"Hello!" he said cheerfully and then paused for a bit before continuing. "Are you really an android?"

"Yeah."

"Amazing. That's just amazing. I've never seen anything like it," the old man shook his head. "I read the few notes that were still intact in the lab. was far beyond his time."

"Well, was a bit of a genius," X said sheepishly while scratching the back of his head.

The old man laughed. "That he was!" He then held a hand out to X. "My name is . I'm an archeologist. I was just searching the area for a fossil record on Mesozoic plant life when I found your pod."

X shook his hand. "X. I've been sleeping here for . . ." He glanced at the date in the bottom right hand of his vision. That was one of the few things that separated him from humans, his systems kept record of the date and time even while asleep. "A hundred years," X muttered.

stared at him in confusion as he did not quite catch what X had muttered.

"I have been asleep for a hundred years," X repeated more clearly. nodded. He already knew that X would have been built around that time as had been dead for nearly a hundred years. The famous robot designer must have given in to old age soon after completing X.

"I never got to say goodbye," X said softly. blinked at him. The tone in X's voice. It almost sounded . . . regretful. But no robot had shown that kind of emotion before. X must really be a leap above anything the world has ever seen. "I knew he was fading, but I was shut down for a good portion of the building process, I didn't think he would have . . ."

cut him off. "Death catches many of us off guard. You were young, and still are. There was no way you could have known that he would have left you so quickly. You cannot blame him for it though." In that moment, almost felt as though he was consoling a child, a _human_ child.

"I know. He was protecting me from the outside world by sealing me away," X said. stared at him in shock.

"The pod explained to me that the world had blamed my older siblings for the deaths that had occurred because of Wily's actions," X explained.

 _He already knows about his sibling's fates,_ thought alarmed. _He knows what the world did to them in their anger?_ _Not only is he the first of his kind, but he is the last as well. That is a lonely path to travel on. He is the first android and the last of 's creations_.

"I noticed that you seemed fearful of me when I first woke up but then you relaxed, why was that?" X asked, curious and wanting to change the subject from his siblings' disappearances.

"My apologies. I did not mean to concern you, but sentient robots such as yourself have not had the best history. With green eyes and blue armor, there really couldn't have been a better remedy to my concerns and fears. Those in the past who had turned against mankind had red eyes and hated the color blue."

X nodded. 's words caused X's mind to wander and fret about similar topics in a way, but he refused to think of them for much longer than a few minutes. Perhaps even a hundred years later, the world was still not ready to accept him.

smiled at him and made his way to the front of the room where the door was. He looked around and patted the walls.

" was a good man. A smart one too. It must have torn him apart to seal you up like that. And yet, the world has forgotten him and his legacy. Perhaps it is for the best. Perhaps not. In time I suppose we shall see." Cain's serious tone suddenly turned joyful and he grinned. "But in the meantime, let's go crack open some soda's and celebrate your awakening, shall we?"

exited the room and X smiled before doing the same. He paused though at the doorway.

"Don't worry . I will guide this world. I will be their hope, but I do not wish to fight. I know I never got to say good bye before and I know it's a bit late, but for what it's worth . . . Goodbye . . . . . . Dad."

Author's Note: I had forgotten how short this chapter was. . . For the most part, I do believe that chapters from now on will be anywhere from 4 to 6 thousand words long. 5 thousand is my goal.

THIS WEBSITE IS DELETING 'S AND 'S NAME. IS THERE SOMETHING I'M DOING WRONG?


	2. Starting a New Life

_"Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it." –Charles R. Swindoll_

 _April 15th_

 _Light was a genius! I've been going over his design notes and they are a quantum leap beyond anything the world has ever seen. Using them as a guide, I may be able to replicate his design and integrate them into a new generation of robots. I'll begin transporting X and the rest of Dr. Light's things back to my lab tomorrow._

 _November 22nd_

 _With X's help I have completed my first "Reploid." Although I don't completely understand how all of Dr. Light's systems works, I was able to make some minor modifications and the reploid seems to be functioning perfectly. His strength and intelligence seem limitless and he is fully able to make his own decisions. In fact, we got into our first argument. How intriguing!_

In the eight months that X had been activated, he had learned much of the world he was brought into. The pod had taught him many things: human cultures, traditions, how to act, how to behave. Much of this he already knew, as it was a part of his core programming, but the pod was merely ensuring that no matter what religion X encountered, he would know how to behave around them. Also a part from X's core programming, he also knew how to speak over a thousand different languages to ensure that he would have a high chance of being able to interact with the world he was brought into.

Granted, while building X, Light knew that there was a very slight chance that things might change in the thirty year minimum gap between X's sealing and his awakening. The world might very well switch to speaking one of the few less spoken languages if given enough time. If something like this happened and X was a robot master, X would not know how to speak that language until he was given a program update specifically designed for his systems that would allow him to speak and understand the language.

However, X was unlike any robot every built before and was _not_ a robot master. In fact, X lacked many of the characteristics a robot master had that enabled them to _be able_ to control and command a less sentient robot such as the ability to control the network and manage many things at once. Multitasking was a gift that only robots with multiple processors had. In order to make X even more human, he only had one processor and while it was incredibly efficient and still far more advanced than any other processor before it, it still paled in comparison to the processing power of two to three of the robot master's processors.

In other words, X reacted to things slower than a robot master did. He couldn't do anything very quickly while on the network and he was merely a guest to the network, not an _administrator_ like a robot master was. Having one processor made him slower in doing _nearly anything_ compared to a robot master.

However, X had many things that robot masters lacked. He could learn. He had _feelings._ Robot masters, while sentient, were known for their lack of emotions. There were a few robot masters that came close to expressing genuine emotions to a human's extent, but none of them expressed emotions to the extent that X did.

None of them would have grown frustrated at the inability to cook a hamburger right without burning it because the grill was too hot. They wouldn't have cared, for all but one of them were not programmed to do such a thing and because it was not a part of their programming, it would not be a part of the things they "cared" about. The one that _was_ programmed to cook wouldn't have burnt the hamburger in the first place.

None of them would have picked up the bird from where it had been discarded at the side of the road after being hit by a semi. None of them would have taken the time to bury it in the state park, right next to a berry bush. A few might have stared at the bird sadly, but none would have stepped out of their way to do such a thing.

None of them would have visited an orphanage just to entertain and play with the kids there. It wasn't a part of their core programming to take care of children. Why should they bother?

Most importantly, most of them wouldn't have cared about seeming human. There was one that did, but he was an anomaly, an anomaly that Doctor Light used to begin creating the basis of X's core programming, X's predecessor, Rock Light, or more commonly known as Megaman.

However, no matter how hard Rock tried, or how much he wanted it to be, Rock was not in the least bit human. He was a robot master, through and through. He didn't quite understand extreme emotions and he would have preferred building advanced technologies in his room rather than go outside and play with the ten year olds he was designed and programmed after. Sure, Rock was playful and childish just like he should be, he even got _Protoman_ to go sledding once. But, his core function was to help Doctor Light in the labs, not play with a few kids. And going against core programming was something a robot master just _couldn't_ do. It was who they were. Defying their core programing was denying their existence and it caused many errors to occur. If the denial continued, said robot would be shut down and their memory might be compromised as their systems might identify their memories as the cause to their resistance and a _threat_.

An incident like that only happened once. And it happened to the first of the robot masters, Doctor Light number (DLN) 000, aka Protoman. Around the house he was known as Blues. (Doctor Light had the habit of naming his 'children' after styles of music. Hence the Rock and Roll Light. Roll was Rock's twin and was programmed as Doctor Light's housekeeper.) At the time of Blues' completion, Wily was still close friends and partners with Doctor Light. Blues had gotten frustrated with the way Wily was treating him and refused to tighten the bolts on the new metal lab table like Wily said. Obeying human orders was one of the many things in Blues' core programming. However, such a crime was not enough for Blues' programming to kick in and take over Blues' body as for some odd reason he was not affected as harshly by the three laws of robotics: Number one; a robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm. Two, a robot must obey the orders given by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law. And three, a robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Laws.

It wasn't Blues' refusal to obey that caused his core programming to wipe his memory. No, it was what happened as a result. Wily assumed that Blues had completed the task assigned because of the three laws, so when he placed the mining mechanaloid's massive engine on the table, he wasn't expecting it to collapse. Three of Wily's toes were crushed in the event and Blues' core programming shut him down and _completely_ wiped his memory as Blues had violated two of the three laws. Doctor Light had to manually restart him in order for him to come online again, but Blues did not remember who he was.

From the very beginning, Blues had displayed a lot more emotion than expected, but that all changed when it was discovered that Blues' core, or in other words his _heart_ , was faulty. At the time, replacing Blues' core would wipe his memory and personality again and Blues did _not_ want that. (He had heard of his previous actions from Wily later) So he left and did not return.

His core malfunctioned and stopped working five years later.

It wasn't just because of their inhuman personalities that gave robot masters a bad reputation. Mostly it was because Wily went crazy. _Really_ crazy. Wily had partaken in an experiment with instant teleportation that Doctor Light _warned_ him not to physically partake in. Teleportation was new and it was unsafe for any living beings to be teleported just yet. Wily didn't listen.

The machine was _nowhere near perfect_. Once Wily rematerialized, he instantly ejected his recent lunch. He felt dizzy and his heart was beating _far_ too fast. Wily was sick for weeks, but once he recovered, it was revealed that something else had happened to Wily other effect his physical state. The teleportation had messed with his _mental_ state as well.

Wily hid it well. Doctor Light did not realize the changes in Wily until the secretly insane scientist had reprogrammed all of Doctor Light's robot masters other than Blues, who was off on his own, and Rock and Roll, who were seen as useless. Wily used the robot masters to terrorize entire cities and attempt to take over the world.

He would have succeeded if Rock hadn't have proved himself to be far more useful than Wily had originally thought.

At Rock's persistent begging, Doctor Light completely remodeled Rock and turned the seemingly harmless lab helper into a war machine, giving the robot master armor, a weapon, and a new name. Rock then proceeded to defeat all of the reprogrammed robot masters and sent them back to Doctor Light to be fixed. Wily was then placed in prison as his actions had killed quite a few people.

After Wily escaped and similar events repeated over and over again, robot masters became hated and soon the world turned on the very robot master that had saved their lives.

On December 5 20XX, the U.S. government destroyed Rock Light in front of two million people and over a billion more through television.

Which was _exactly_ why Doctor Light sealed X away. The world was not ready for another type of robot, especially one that was not bound by the three laws.

Rock's destruction was also the key reason why X and the reploid that Doctor Cain had managed to build were remaining hidden from the world.

Or, well, they _attempted_ to stay hidden. One of the workers that went with Doctor Cain to find the fossils on Mesozoic plant life had apparently rattled off to his wife about the discovery of X. The news spread like wild fire, but the consequences for it weren't nearly as violent or negative as Doctor Cain and X had feared. In fact, mankind almost seemed willing to accept the new brand of robot. The government, however, was harder to convince.

Which was why Fredrick (the reploid Doctor Cain and X had built) and X still remained inside Cain labs, safe from the wrath and curiosity of the outside world.

* * *

X happily glanced around the green house he worked in, buried deep inside the maze that was Cain labs. The plants somehow made him happy and he enjoyed caring for the more difficult to grow specimens. The slow work calmed him and kept his mind off of the struggles he and Doctor Cain were facing in the outside world. For the most part, people left him alone, and he was free to study the plants in peace. He thoroughly enjoyed it.

As it turned out, X was a natural when it came to plants. After discovering X's natural affinity for botany soon after the android's activation, Doctor Cain introduced him to the agricultural section of his science division as something to help keep the android's mind off of what the outside world thought of him. X was hooked immediately.

His curiosity was spiked. Instantly, he began raiding the nearest library during his free time to learn more about the new world he had been introduced to. Granted, he still had the mind of a teenager in a way and sometimes he would grow bored and try to engage in more entertaining things such as video games or exploring.

During X's studying, Doctor Cain discovered a few things about the android that amazed him. Just like humans, X appeared to be good at some things like plants, but completely fail at others like ping pong. (Even though X was a robot and his systems could predict the movement of the plastic ball, he failed to wrap his mind around the point of swatting a ball from one end of the table to the other and had mentally labeled it as a last resort boredom cure and time killer. That was what he told Doctor Cain at least. In truth, X, for some odd reason, could not for the life of him get the ball to bounce the way he wanted it to.) Just like humans, X made mistakes and sometimes _forgot_ even though his mind recorded everything he experienced. X had flaws. And that was what made him so human, so perfect.

Doctor Cain had been amazed by X from the very beginning. Even though the few reploids build so far were supposed to be based off of X, they lacked many humanlike characteristics that X had. One of them was a "sixth sense".

X somehow could predict things a bit before it happened and he got weird vibes from people sometimes. Some of which made him nervous or uneasy, others made him relaxed and comfortable. This was the only reason X trusted Doctor Cain so easily. No other reploid built so far had developed a feeling like this.

X also had a strong will. Something that reploids were also lacking in. Sure they might have had a little bit of will, but they had not unlocked it to the potential that X had. X could be stubborn at times. Especially when it came to another's safety.

And then came X's ability to evolve. His systems had the unique ability to adapt to any situation as discovered when Doctor Cain and X went on a trip to the South Pole to fix a device that was preventing and even reversing some of the effects from global warming. X went out in the middle of the night to investigate an energy flux in the device and was frozen solid. It took Doctor Cain four hours with a blow torch to unfreeze him the next day. Soon after that, X's systems upgraded itself and X was able to function perfectly fine in negative twenty degrees Celsius.

A similar event happened when X refused to recharge after working nonstop underground for three days, investigating a rare fungus that could be the answer to an antidote for a particularly deadly citrus plant disease. He realized his battery was in critical condition soon after managing to find, collect, and preserve the fungus and had sent a distress signal out to Doctor Cain when he realized that he wasn't going to make it out of the cave in time.

Needless to say, Doctor Cain was upset and had scolded X for his ignorance and X's battery had nearly doubled its efficiency levels with the upgrade following.

X had shrugged off the scolding saying that the risk was worth it. The fungus had proved to be useful and he had soon developed a cure for the disease. However, the fungus was too rare and soon X was halving his time between finding another solution and finding a way to successfully cultivate the fungus.

Between helping Doctor Cain develop his inventions and studying plants, X was a typical teenager. He enjoyed playing video games once in a while, and spent much of his free time hanging out with humans his age. Granted, much of this he did under his code name, Xavier Light. Nearly everyone knew who X was and how he was working with Doctor Cain to develop a new line of robots. They knew that he was an android who wore blue armor with a red gem on his helmet. They didn't know, however, that beneath all that armor, X was a rather short, green eyed, brown haired teen with a liking for plants. Doctor Cain and X had made sure that nobody figured out that Xavier Light and X were one and the same.

While he did hang out with others his age, he never made any close friends for the first few months, mainly because he feared they would treat him differently if they knew who and what he was. One of them had even informed him that she thought that X was probably an arrogant, know it all, hero wannabe, not knowing that the X she was referring to was the X she was talking to.

X's human friends were a curious bunch. There was Mark, a brute of a human. His large stature gave him the upper hand in nearly any sport and he was the star player of his school's football team. However, despite his fame and power, Mark had a gentle soul. He was quiet, but couldn't be counted as shy. He loved younger kids and hated violence, but he wasn't afraid to stand up for a friend. Mark was just about six foot three with short blonde hair and green eyes. He loved to wear his comic book shirts and was what Sam liked to call "a fangirl at heart."

Then there was Sam, a near exact opposite of Mark. Sam was loud and obnoxious. While Mark was gentle, Sam wasn't afraid to give her enemy a good punch in the nose if she felt even only slightly threatened. She was small, only coming in at just over five foot two, but her loud mouth and her fearless personality made her seem like a ferocious lion. Sam had blonde hair and hazel eyes that couldn't make up their mind on what color to be.

Tony was the prankster. He and Sam often pulled pranks on the principle and got in trouble _all the time._ X was often left wondering how he was still in school the next day after pulling such pranks, namely the one where Tony had triggered the door to dump a bucket or hair dye on the teacher. Surprisingly, nobody told on Tony and he continued to get away with acts of treason. Like Sam, Tony didn't seem to be afraid of anything. He had auburn hair that stuck up in the back and green eyes. Tony was also what Sam called "a fangirl at heart." However, Tony was also a "nerd" as Sam put it. He took pride in knowing a lot about things even though he never used any of his skills in school.

Lastly, there was Nicole. She was a lot like Mark in the way that she was quiet, but unlike Mark, she was clearly shy. She only really opened up around her friends. Other than that, she was a quiet kid that tended to stay in the corners. She loved to watch anime and read manga. She also wrote incredible stories and was a well-known author online going by the pen name "Dragonheart". She had brown hair and startling light blue eyes. She and Sam were best friends.

X had quite literally bumped into the group one day. He was exiting the movie theatre just after watching the latest version of "Godzilla". Needless to say he found it quite interesting. Doctor Cain had insisted that X should take the day off and having nothing better to do, X went to the movie theaters in the middle of Arcadia, the hometown of Cain labs. He wore a blue sweat shirt and tee shirt underneath with blue jeans and sneakers in order to form a more human appearance. While leaving the darkened room and thinking over how scientifically impossible it was for a lizard, prehistoric or not, to grow that big, he bumped into someone who was also leaving the large theater room, but had stopped to argue with someone ahead of him.

Unfortunately for him, it was Sam.

"Sorry," X apologized, snapping out of his thoughts. The blonde haired girl he had bumped into whirled around to stare at him. "I was lost in my thoughts."

"Thinking about what?" the girl challenged him standing on her toes so that she could make up the half inch difference between her and X.

"How scientifically possible it would be for that movie to actually happen," X said calmly. The girl instantly retreated from him with a grin and turned to an auburn haired boy near her, the one she had been arguing with earlier.

"See?" she stated as she gestured over to X. "Even he knows it's impossible."

"I never said that," X muttered. He glanced around them. People were giving them glares as they had stopped in the middle of the walkway while others were still trying to exit the theater room. X felt slightly guilty for blocking their way, but there really was no positive outcome for him. If he got out of the way and left, the blonde might get upset with him for leaving when she had dragged him into the conversation.

"But if Godzilla were to eat a lot," the auburn haired boy said. X looked at him with an 'are you serious?' look.

"Um genetics? Every genetic structure in its entire body would have to be changed first, and _then_ it would have to eat a lot," X stated. "Do you realize how unlikely it is for every cell to be changed _exactly_ the same way. It's just about impossible! He'd have to be genetically modified from before birth, as a stem cell."

"But radiation-," the auburn haired boy started.

"Doesn't mutate every cell in the body the same way," X finished. Sam grinned at him. "Well, sort of. There's a slight possibility. But, it's a one in a billionth to the negative billionth that Godzilla would happen. But it was a _good_ movie no matter how scientifically possible it is, so I guess if people want to make a movie about near impossible odds, then that's fine with me."

The auburn haired boy grinned at him. "See, Sam. He accepts that it's possible. If only slightly."

The blonde, Sam frowned. "I thought you were on my side."

"I was supposed to pick sides?" X asked, confused. He thought he was only dragged into the conversation to state his opinion, not support one particular side in a debate.

The auburn haired boy and the blonde laughed.

"Hey guys? Could we debate this someplace other than in the middle of the walkway?" a large teen asked, making his presence known. It was then that X noticed another girl standing next to the large teen, clutching a small notebook as if her life depended on it. The group nodded and began moving once more towards the exit of the building, though at that point, most of the people stuck in the theater room had found their way out and there really was no point to moving for the soul purpose of getting out of somebody's way.

X listened to the group's conversation as they exited the building, but once they got outside, X paused and looked up to the sky as the small group continued.

It was still only just about ten thirty in the morning. X sighed. It looked like he was going to end up touring the city today. He turned in the opposite direction the others had and began walking.

Sam stopped and turned to look at the brown haired teen's retreating back.

"Uh Sam? What's wrong?" the auburn haired boy asked.

"Am I the only one that gets this weird vibe off of him?" Sam asked. The others shrugged.

"I guess, why?" the auburn haired boy asked.

"You know how I told you that when I first met you guys, I kind of got this weird feeling that you guys were cool and we became best buds?"

The group nodded. Sam continued.

"Well, I'm getting that vibe again."

"Him?" the tallest one of the group asked, a large hand pointing to X's back. Sam nodded.

"Well, you're the captain. We'll follow you to the ends of the earth, milady," the auburn haired boy joked. Sam rolled her eyes and turned to the girl who was clutching the notebook. "Hey Nicole, what do you think?"

The girl, Nicole, shrugged. "I mean, he kind of gives off this gentle, but powerful kind of feeling," Nicole shyly stated. Sam nodded.

"Well that settles it." She turned around and sucked in a deep breath. "HEY BRUNETTE WITH THE LIKING FOR BLUE!"

X stopped. He had brown hair. And then he glanced down at his clothes. _And_ he was wearing all blue. She was probably talking to him. He turned around as Sam ran up to him.

"So what are you doing after this?" Sam asked.

"I honestly don't know. My . . . guardian kicked me out of the house for the day," X said.

"Guardian? What happened to your parents?" Sam asked. X shrugged.

"Never knew my mom and I only knew my dad for a few moments before he disappeared," X partially lied. He didn't want to tell her the truth that he was an android from a hundred years in the past.

"Well come with us then. We've got all day to kill too before we have to be home and you don't sound like you're going anywhere." X shrugged and followed her back to the other three.

"So I'm Tony. The big guy there is Mark and the quiet one next to him is Nicole. They're both quiet actually. And twins. Well they're not _real_ twins, but they act like it sometimes. And the loud mouth over there is Samantha," the auburn haired boy, Tony, introduced. Mark waved at him and Nicole sent him a small smile.

"It's _Sam_ ," Sam hissed. Then she turned to X. "Call me Samantha and I will rip out your heart and feed it to my cat."

X blinked. So far he had not witnessed so much violence from a human. It was kind terrifying. But the good thing was that they didn't seem to realize just yet that X was actually an android and his "heart" was made out of rare metals.

"So what school are you from?" Tony asked just after Sam finished speaking, not realizing that X hadn't introduced himself. Granted, Tony didn't give him much time to do so.

" I'm . . . homeschooled," X answered. That was the best way to describe being stuck in a pod and being taught by an A.I. system for a hundred years.

"That's cool," Tony commented.

"And you guys?" X asked.

"We all go to Arcadia High. So what do you do for fun?" Sam answered. X internally winced. He had only just recently been activated. How was he to know? Sure he liked plants, but he knew for a fact that such a thing would come off as strange.

"A little bit of everything, I suppose," X responded. Sam nodded.

"Ever watched anime?" Tony asked.

"Ani-what now?"

"Did you live under a rock or something for a hundred years?" Tony asked. _Yes, actually_ , X responded in his head. _And in a pod too._

"What Tony means to say is anime is a type of animated tv show that usually originates from Japan," Sam said.

"And it is amazing," Tony said.

"Well some of them," Sam said. "A lot of them can be horrifying. Only watch the ones we tell you you can watch."

X nodded as the group stopped in front of a store with Japanese letterings on it. X instantly translated the information in his head. _The Anime Shop: Anime! Manga! Fun for all ages!_

"And this is an anime store," Sam said gesturing to the small building.

"What is manga?" X asked, curious. He didn't realize that he probably wasn't supposed to be able to read Japanese.

"Where'd you hear that?" Tony asked.

"Um." X internally panicked and pointed to the letterings. It was too late now to try and cover up his mistake.

"Dude, how can you read Japanese and not know what Manga is?! Okay, okay. Manga is the comic book version of anime. Got it?"

X nodded and the group went inside. Instantly, Nicole who had been quiet the entire trip there, happily ran around the small store a couple times, spreading her arms out wide like an airplane.

"She's an anime nerd," Tony explained at X's obvious surprise and confusion. "She's even worse than me, but you can never tell until you bring her to a store or a convention."

X stared around the store. It was very small compared to most stores he had been in. Parts of the shelves were packed full with what appeared to be thick black and white comic books. He guessed that those were the manga books Tony described. The rest of the shelves were stocked full of posters of animated characters and other odd trinkets, such as T-shirts and key chains. In one corner of the store, there was a shelf full of DVDs with a TV next to it. A three person tan couch was placed in front of it, resting on a matching carpeted floor. Mark went over to the DVD full shelf and after a few moments of thought, he plucked one from the selection and took the disk out. He then placed the disk in the DVD player and turned the small device and the TV on, sitting on the couch soon after doing so. X, Tony, and Sam walked over to the corner.

"Friend . . . I have no idea who you are. Who are you?" Mark asked, turning to look up at X from his place on the couch. _He's gone this long without noticing that I haven't told him my name?,_ X thought. He hid an amused smile and responded to the question.

"Uh . . Xavier. Xavier Light," X partially lied again, using his code name.

"Uh Xavier?" Sam questioned. X winced internally. He had been staying away from people for a while now and hadn't yet gotten used to his fake name. "Do you not know your own name?"

"Sam, be nice," Mark scolded.

"Whatever. Come on, we need to introduce you to the world of anime," Sam proclaimed as she dragged him over to the three person couch. X was squeezed between Mark and Sam. Tony sat on the last section of the couch, successfully placing four people on a three person couch, one of them being a giant.

"A bit tight isn't it?" X asked. Sam shook her head.

"We do this all the time with Nicole. If you're going to be our friend, you going to have to put up with movie and anime Saturday," Sam responded.

"Friend? We only just met," X stated, confused. Did humans really make friends this fast? What happened to caution? Then again, why did he care? They didn't know he was an android, right? He wasn't in any danger. Besides, Doctor Cain was always pestering him about making friends anyways.

"So? I like you. There's something about you that's different, weird. And we're a group of weirdos who don't let other weirdos be alone," Sam explained with a proud grin.

"Whether they want it or not," Tony added. Mark hummed an agreement and the disk menu popped up.

"Sword Art online, Season one?" Tony asked.

"Ain't that a really old show? Like over a century old?" Sam asked.

"We haven't seen it," Mark reasoned. Nicole zoomed in from seemingly out of nowhere and lay down on the floor, before the TV, not having a care in the world that X was sitting in her spot.

Mark clicked on the first episode and it began playing. From out of nowhere, Sam handed a box of something called pocky. X blinked and accepted the gift. X recognized the box as being from a stand near the cash register in the anime store. When Sam purchased the box was a mystery to him.

The mystery of where Sam had gotten the boxes from was solved when she pulled a few more from a bag on the floor and handed it to her friends.

Just about eighteen minutes had past and the episode had finished. The group just turned to look at each other in partial shock. X had a pocky stick in his mouth that had been there since the beginning of the show, not really knowing what to do with it. He had guessed it was food and had meant to casually check while the others were watching the show, but he had become transfixed by the slightly terrifying plot and had forgotten. As a result, the pocky stick hung at the edge of his mouth for the entirety of the episode.

"That had horrible animation," Tony stated bluntly. Technology in the ways of animation had advanced greatly over the past century and it was clear the show was of an older origin.

"But the plot," Sam started.

"Oh, the plot," Tony added.

Nicole turned around to stare at them with pleading eyes.

"I've come to a conclusion. . . .MARK! BEGIN THE NEXT EPISODE!" Tony exclaimed, standing and pointing his finger to the sky. Sam punched him in the shoulder.

"Heyyyyyy, _Saaaam_!"Tony whinced. Sam glared at him.

"That's my line and you know it," Sam informed him. Tony gave a light hearted chuckled as he scratched the back of his head. He then turned to X and gave him an exasperated look. "And Xavier, you _eat_ the pocky. It's not a cigarette. I swear you were raised under a rock. How does that even _taste_ right?"

And thus began the SAO marathon. Which was followed by a FMA marathon.

About two hours in, Mark, Sam, and Tony had to call their parents saying that they were going to be home late, really late. They were going to try and finish both seasons one and two. Apparently Nicole's parents didn't care what time she came home at which concerned X, so she did not call any of hers.

Sixteen hours later at around four in the morning, the group finished and the store manager was staring at them with tired eyes. The front of his shirt was partially wet as he had fallen asleep waiting for the teenagers' marathon to finish and had drooled all over the front end of it.

"You done with your marathon?" the store manager asked. The group tiredly nodded. Well, X's exhaustion was faked as he was an android. He only needed to recharge in his pod for a few hours every four to five days and it had only been one and a half since he had recharged last. His battery was at seventy five percent; nowhere near the range where he began to slow down and get tired. "Then I'm closing the store."

The group left the store muttering something about not having rides due to it being so late . . .or early.

"That got weird," Tony tiredly commented as they walked to the nearest bus station. Sam and Mark hummed an affirmative.

"But it was still good," Mark added.

"The ending of SAO two was sad," Nicole said, speaking for the first time around X.

"Guys? How about we come here next week? Nine o'clock in the morning," Nicole said quietly. "I like anime Saturdays."

"Sure thing Nicky," Sam said. X nodded. He wouldn't mind returning. In fact, he rather liked this place.

X realized something as his new friends got on a bus and waved goodbye; he may have just developed a bond over anime and chocolate covered crackers. X smiled to himself and hummed Crossing Field to himself happily as he began the long walk back to the lab.

 **Author's Note:** I am very new to this website and I am still trying to work things out. For some weird reason, the website is not showing words when I copy and paste it. It also is not accepting my word documents. For now though, this will have to do. I will look into it. The website really doesn't like Light's name as a "dr." in the second paragraph so it keeps on getting rid of it. I add his name in and when I save it, it immediately gets rid of it. It's getting rid of all of the names that start with "Dr" including Cain's. Does anybody know what's going on? I have replaced all of them by spelling out the "doctor" but I don't think that flows as well. If there is anything else that appears to be missing or confusing, let me know and I will look into it.


	3. Feelings

_"_ _One advantage of talking to yourself is that you know at least somebody's listening."-Franklin P. Jones_

X was working on a programming code for a mailing droid when Doctor Cain came down the stairs to the lab at around seven in the morning.

"What time did you get home?" Doctor Cain asked.

"About five in the morning," X answered. He remained focused on his task and typed a few more lines into the computer.

" _Five_?! I'm guessing you had fun then?" Doctor Cain asked as he pulled a chair over to sit next to the android.

"Yeah, I might have made some new friends."

"Human?"

"Um, yeah?" X stated giving Doctor Cain a weird look. As far as he knew, he, Fredrick, and a few others were the only human like machines out there. Nearly all of the ones he did know spent all of their time in Cain Labs. He and Fredrick were the only ones that left Cain labs regularly and that was only because they stayed at Doctor Cain's house. The house had three floors. X's and Fredrick's were on the top floor. Doctor Cain slept on the first floor, right next to the kitchen, stairs, bathroom, and dining room. The living room was located next to the dining room and across from the stairs. The basement was completely a lab, but it did have a washing and drying machine set up in a random corner.

Doctor Cain shrugged at X's look. "Who knows? Perhaps somebody else had developed an android. Or perhaps one of your friends was an alien. I didn't know for sure. But what on earth were they doing staying up till five in the morning?!" Cain exclaimed.

"Something called an anime marathon that they dragged me into," X answered.

"Anime? Huh. Did you enjoy it?"

"It was just like watching a tv show."

Doctor Cain nodded. "So how many of them were there?"

"Four," X said.

"Do they know?" X knew Cain was asking about his mechanical nature.

"No. I avoided telling them anything that would lead to that," X responded.

"How come?"

X sighed. "Something Dad said to me. That and all of the pressure we're already facing with only the very fact that I _exist_."

Doctor Cain made an "o" with his mouth and didn't press any further. "How old are they?"

"About fifteen."

"They go to a school?"

"Yeah."

"Which one?"

* * *

"Arcadia High."

"Do you wanna enroll?"

X stopped his work and turned to Doctor Cain. "Enroll?"

"Yeah, you know, go to school?"

"Doctor Cain, I'm a robot. The pod has already schooled me on everything there is to know for a kid my age. Erh well the age I appear; I look about fifteen or sixteen."

"So? You'll be a straight A student," Doctor Cain reasoned. X stared at him. "Oh come on, it'll be a great socializing activity."

"But I have work here to get done," X argued.

"I can guarantee you that Doctor Light did not build you to be a constant worker. He designed you to be _human_. That means doing human things; going to school, socializing. He wanted you to live your life as you wanted to. Don't worry about the lab. I managed just fine before you came. Besides, the reploid designs are complete. I just have to convince people that they're worth it to manufacture," Doctor Cain reasoned. "So, are you going to let me enroll you?"

X thought about it. "Yeah. You can enroll me. I'll go to high school."

Doctor Cain smiled and clapped his hands together.

"Wonderful! I will go do just that before this old mind forgets!" Doctor Cain said, getting up from his chair. "And X?"

"Yeah?"

"I completed the mailing droids programming last night. It's under file 371. You can look over it if you want."

There was a thud as X's head made contact with the desk he was sitting at and a loud groan filled the air. Doctor Cain chuckled.

"Don't forget. We need to be down at the mall in a couple of hours!" Doctor Cain added as he climbed up the stairs.

"Yeah I know," X moaned, but his voice was muffled by the desk he was speaking into.

 _6 hours later_

Working at an information booth for six hours wasn't exactly X's definition of fun. However, it was necessary, especially when Fredrick started getting nervous at all of the attention he was getting. Ever since he had discovered that the world wasn't quite so accepting towards his kind, he became paranoid that somebody would figure out that he wasn't human right away. In X's opinion, it really only made the situation worse, but he supposed that Fred could pass of as an extremely shy and nervous human.

X on the other hand had no problem speaking to humans. He core _programming_ was to communicate and intermingle with humans. It felt natural to him. Sometimes, though, he still got a bit nervous, but after the world had exterminated his elder brother years ago just for being robotic, who wouldn't? In fact, there really was no reason why X was intermingling at all; except for the fact that like a human, his sanity would be greatly impacted by a lack of social activity.

That and X had felt a responsibility to repay Doctor Cain for taking care of him in the last few months. In a way Doctor Cain was just as much a father to him as Doctor Light had been. He supposed it was because X had known Doctor Cain for much longer than he had Doctor Light.

Which was why he was explaining to an older gentleman how a mailing droid worked. To X it really was quite simple, _far_ less advanced than anything he was made out of, and even though the man before him had _clearly_ been born into the age of robotics, he didn't seem to have even the slightest clue as to how the hunk of metal, plastic, and wires before him even worked. X hoped that the man's faulty memory wasn't the result of some terrible accident as a child and it was just old age.

He had to repeat to the old man what the disk like device at the bottom of the mechanaloid was for the fifth time before he regretted ever being hopeful.

"Ah, my apology's. You see, when I was young'r me mum say Pap acidently dropped me down a laund'y shaf'. I hit my head prehtty har' und Mum say I wern't ever da same agayn. You see young'r, me mum was a fine wohman."

X nodded, ever so grateful that Doctor Light had given him the ability to interpret the way people spoke.

"On me fifteenth birdday, some men in black uneeforms came and say somin' 'bout me mum committin' murd'r or somin' like tha'. They took mum and lef'. Me dad never came back either but I see his face on TV. He were migh'y beat up. Migh'y beat up. Missin' half his throa' and all. Nev'r came back dough. Nah' in all long time. He was me pap so he shouda come back cuz he lov'd me. Wonder wah' happened to him. He gonna show up eventahly dough."

X suddenly wished he didn't understand a word the man was saying and forced out a nod. His smile had near completely disappeared and his face was strained in order to keep the little smile he had left intact.

"Me mum were a fine wohman indeedy." The man left and X breathed a huge sigh of relief and sat on the ground.

"Nooooooooo, that was _not_ okay. _Not okay._ Nooooooooo."

"Uh X-erh Xavier? Are you okay?" Fredrick asked as he watched X's face contort to a look of pure horror, nearly slipping up and saying X's real name.

"No. I am not okay," X moaned. He ran a hand through his hair.

"Uh X?" Fredrick inquired, trying to get more out of the android.

X shuddered as Doctor Cain walked up to their booth.

"How's it going Fredrick? Where's Xavier?" the old scientist asked. Fredrick shrugged and then looked down at X who was hidden from Doctor Cain's view by the booth. Doctor Cain leaned over the booth to look at the android. "X?"

"That man's mom _killed his dad_ and he still thinks his dad's _coming back for him_. And they think _we're_ the ones that have issues," X hissed looking up at Doctor Cain. Fredrick's eyes widened and his mouth made an "o".

Doctor Cain sighed. "I never said humans were perfect. You make a good point there though. We were being highly hypocritical when we banished your kind from ever being developed. This isn't related but I think we should call it good for today. You two can stay here for a while longer though if you put away the stuff on the booth. I still have another meeting to go to."

X nodded, relieved. He felt no need to meet somebody else like that.

* * *

Fredrick glanced at X amused. The android had been muttering about humans, stereotypes, and the inability to forgive and forget for a while now as they pushed the carts full of the booth items through the vacant roadways behind the mall and to the truck. After a while he stopped muttering and sighed before starting a rant of a different, but related subject.

"That man had to have been seventy or eighty. His mom would have been arrested like sixty years ago. Nobody just outright told him that his dad was dead? And what's with this deal of him getting dropped down a laundry shaft. Who 'accidentally' drops a young child down a laundry shaft? That doesn't sound accidental. It sounds intended. This is _child abuse_ and _murder_. His mom gets sent to prison. But all it takes is for one of us to mess up and _all of us_ get executed. Biased much? Why do the humans get more chances? What's the difference between me and some human in this building?" X ranted.

"Solar powered core, internal cooling system, a processor, adaptable optics, a few thousand wires, and a titanium skeleton to start," Fredrick listed, counting off on his fingers. X glared at the younger robot. "Not to mention enhanced titanium armor and a buster."

"I meant _spiritually_ ," X grumbled.

"Spiritually? Geez Xavier, you're getting deep." X glared at Fredrick again who chuckled lightly. The younger robot then sighed. "But you're right. Humans are very biased and it scares me. I don't want to mess up and convict you and the others too. There isn't very many of us. I know Doctor Cain is trying to get our type on assembly lines, but what'll happen when something bad happens? What if they decide to execute all of us? They did that to your predecessor. What do we do when the robots that come off the assembly line, if they do come and they probably will, what do we do when they go crazy?"

X sighed and pondered the question. "Do we have much of a choice? I suppose if we were cowards, we would go and hide and leave the world to its destruction. But is that any better than the way they executed my predecessor? We would have practically signed of their death certificates. They would be defenseless against our kind. We can blend into almost any human environment. We're stronger, faster, quick witted. . . With that in mind, I would probably fight for humanity. Not because they have really done anything for me as a whole, but because it's the right thing to do and morally, I could never sit by and watch a massacre happen. That and I promised my father I would protect this world."

The two were silent for a while as they started stacking objects into the truck. Then Fredrick spoke up. "Spiritually Xavier, you're more human than any human I've ever met. Even Doctor Cain. And that's saying something. There really is no difference between you and a human other than your design and composition. Doctor Cain confessed the other day that he forgot you were an android whenever he talked to you or watched the way you interacted with the world. You have a better chance than I do at blending in. My 'human like' programming is faulty, Xavier. It's the same way for every replicated android built since me. As human as we seem, we're not perfect. There's a slight mechanical nature to the way we do things that we just can't hide. But Xavier, you're programming is flawless. Not only can _nobody_ decipher it, but it makes you more human than any A.I. before you. If anybody is the least likely to get executed like your predecessors did, it would be you."

They were silent as they finished and closed all of the doors to the truck.

"But Xavier?"

X turned to look at the younger robot.

"Promise me something? If I go crazy and start killing people, would you be the one to pull the trigger? I'm terrified to die by human hands. That and I want to be sure that if I do go crazy, I want to die knowing there's somebody I trust looking out for the world and taking care of it."

X nodded grimly. "Yeah, I promise."

"Thanks X," Fredrick sighed relieved as he gave a small smile. X chose to ignore the slip up with his code name. Fredrick then looked up at the sky. "Do you think there's a heaven up there for beings like us?"

X looked up to the sky as well as he pondered the question. "I don't see why not. If what you said is true, then there's not much of a difference between us and mankind. If there isn't a heaven up there for us, then it would seem that even the gods are biased and hate even something that mankind built."

"If there is, I would like to go there someday. And I hope that it's linked to the human's heaven. I want to meet your dad, Xavier. He built you and I want to thank him for it. You make living in a world where it seems everyone would hate you for the slightest mistake a lot easier. You're my big brother. I also want to meet your predecessor and all of your older brothers and sisters. That and if I do go crazy. I can tell you sorry when you come up there too."

"I'm sure there's a heaven up there for us Fredrick," X reassured him giving the reploid a smile. Fredrick grinned right back at him.

With the booth items all put away, there was no reason for X to stay outside, so he began making his way back to the mall. He stopped though, when he realized that Fredrick wasn't following him.

"Hey Fredrick! Are you coming?" X asked. Fredrick turned to face him and shook his head.

"Nah, I think . . . I think that's enough human interaction for me today. There's so many of them and I'm terrified that they'll find out I'm not human. I . . . I don't know how you do it, Xavier. You're so calm around them and yet they're the ones that killed your older siblings."

"That's exactly how I do it, Fredrick."

"Huh?"

"They're not the ones that killed by brothers and sisters. The ones that did are long since gone," X explained with a smile. Fredrick sighed.

"You must be immune to the threat of possible dangers."

"I'm not immune Fredrick. It's just the way I am. Live a little Fred! You can't do much cooped up in Cain labs all the time like the others."

Fred smiled but shook his head. "I don't think I'm ready just yet. Have fun for me, would you, X?"

"Yeah, but really Fredrick. It's fine. It's not like we would be walking past a whole bunch of metal scanners. Who's going to find out?"

Fredrick shook his head again and X sighed, continuing his path back to the mall.

* * *

X glanced around at the crowded mall stores in disinterest. He had no need for clothes, food, or shoes. Granted, his wardrobe probably need something other than blue or green in it, but that was a task for a later date. He glanced down at his black Cain Labs shirt. The Labs' logo was near the top and on the right side. This was the only shirt that _wasn't_ blue or green.

Besides, he didn't have much when it came to money. He couldn't afford much of what was in any of the stores. How a pair of poor durability, but high comfort jeans came to equal forty five dollars was beyond him.

He was hoping for a computer or technology store, but he hadn't stumbled upon one yet. He had stumbled upon a confectioner's store though and was tempted to drop in just because of the tantalizing smell, but had decided against it. The store was too crowded and from the chocolates and other delicacies displayed in the store window, it was expensive too. X resolved to bug Doctor Cain about getting him and the others some later.

X let out a shout of joy, alarming a few of the people around him when a tech store appeared from around the corner. He ignored the odd looks and increased his pace.

Strolling into the store, he noticed a few things immediately. One of them was that it wasn't nearly impressive as Cain Labs. Granted, Cain Labs was a technological and scientific industry that specialized in making advanced machinery. The store also didn't have nearly as many items as he would have preferred. X would have filled the entire walls with goods, but his store rating would have probably dropped due to poor appearance. Another thing that he noticed was that while it was lacking in a few brands, it seemed to have nearly everything a computer geek at least could want.

He glanced down at the information for a windows laptop and nearly laughed out loud. A thousand gigabytes of space? He'd seen more on his flash drive. Granted, his flash drive _was_ from Cain Labs and it was probably the most spacious one they had. X had all of his research on it, so he kept it on him at all times.

He glanced around. High speed cables, flash drives, cameras, speakers, recording devices, headsets; the list went on, but nothing really caught his interest. He was really just seeing what was available to the public in the ways of computer sciences. As a member of Cain Labs and technological wonder, he had been given an advanced laptop and anything he might need for free which included his own lab and a flash drive.

As he was inspecting a camera, there was a shout and a few familiar voices invaded his auditory receptors. He looked up from where he was standing in the back of the store and confirmed his suspicions.

* * *

"TONY! Why do you have to be such a nerd?!" Sam groaned as she and Mark were dragged into the tech store. Nicole followed loyally behind.

"BECAUSE I JUST AM AND SO ARE YOU SO JUST BE QUIET!" Tony shouted, causing the store manager to glare at him.

"WELL I'M NOT THIS NERDY AND WHY ARE WE SHOUTING!" Sam exclaimed.

"I DON'T KNOW BUT SHUT UP BEFORE WE GET KICKED OUT!"

Sam laughed and looked around the store muttering something about a techno geek. Her eyes widened when she recognized a brown haired teen at the back of the store.

"Hey Xavier!" Sam shouted and pretended to be completely oblivious to the glare Tony was giving her for speaking so loud. She waved to the green eyed teen who casually waved back.

Curious as to why 'Xavier' was in a tech store, the four went over to his location to find him looking at a camera. He seemed to be judging its worth.

"Heya Xavier, whatch ya doin' here?" Sam asked while Tony got distracted by a gaming system and wandered off. X shrugged.

"Just looking I guess. Don't really need anything here. There's nothing here that even compares in quality to the stuff at Cain Labs," X explained, but then immediately, internally winced at his mistake. He may have revealed too much information.

"Cain Labs?!" Tony asked excitedly, overhearing X. The teen's words had spiked an interest in Tony and he came right back over like a moth attracted to light. Tony glanced at X's shirt. "WAIT YOU WORK AT _CAIN LABS_! I THOUGHT YOU WERE HOMESCHOOLED!"

"Keep it down, Tony," Mark commented.

"Sure Dad," Tony sarcastically responded.

"Not really," X covered, trying not to be too quick as to give away his nervousness. "My guardian works there and I help them out with community service projects. I just finished one here a little bit ago." Which wasn't a lie. Tony nodded enthusiastically.

"That's wicked dude!" Tony said. He then became like an excited puppy. "Have you seen X?!"

"X?" Nicole asked. Tony turned around to explain to her.

"Yeah. Doctor Cain found this old android built by Doctor Light a hundred years ago in an underground lab. Apparently even though the android is a hundred years out of date, he's far more advanced than anything this world has ever seen!"

Nicole made an "o" with her mouth and Tony turned around to look at X again.

"So have you seen him?" the excited teen asked again. X internally panicked. This was the one conversation he wanted to avoid.

"Uh, yeah, I see him around every so often," X answered.

"What's he like?"

"Well, he's . . . interesting. He kind of acts a lot like a human would to certain things, but he avoids the public most of the time because of the attention he's been getting."

"Man, what I would give to meet him in person," Tony said blissfully. _You already have_ , X's internal voice whispered.

"So do you think you can get me in there one day?! I'd love to check that place out. I hear there's some insane tech there," Tony asked. X scratched the back of his head.

"I'm not too sure I'd be able to get you in. I'd have to talk to one of the higher ups and even then our access would be limited," X said. Actually, it wouldn't be that hard considering he knew that Doctor Cain wouldn't have a problem with it and Doctor Cain was the _owner_ and _founder_ of Cain Labs.

"Ah man. Well one could only hope," Tony sighed.

"Isn't Cain Labs trying to get the government to mass produce robots?" Sam asked a dark expression on her face.

"Yeah? Why?" X asked. Sam sighed.

"It's nothing. I guess my family doesn't have a very high opinion of robots."

"How come?" X asked.

"Don't ask. Everyone in her family is really sensitive about the topic," Mark stated.

"It's fine. If he's going to be around a lot now, he should probably know," Sam said. "My family has always hated robots since my great grandparents were killed by a few of Doctor Light's robots that went crazy a hundred years ago. Nothing good will come of robots. There's gonna be a virus that breaks out and infects all of the robots, turning them crazy and causing them to kill people. And you know what? X is going to be just as much of an idiot as his predecessor was and he's going to fight these robots. And in the end, he'll go crazy too," Sam ranted. "He'll think he's all high and mighty cause he's an android and he'll fight the crazies. He may be stronger and faster than us humans, but he's nothing but a pile of bolts and wires when you come down to it. His feelings are artificial no matter how human he is. They're not genuine feelings, they're fake. X isn't a quantum leap above anything. He's just a computer that was programmed to respond to things differently. There's nothing human like about him. He's probably just some arrogant snobbish know it all who wants to be a hero."

"Blunt much Sam?" Tony asked.

To say X wasn't hurt would be a lie. X was very hurt. He did not speak for the next few minutes and struggled to hide his pain from the four. Sam however noticed his silence and sighed.

"Look Xavier, if you want to believe that X is human, that's fine. But I was raised to despise robots," Sam said.

"What? Uh, no. I'm not . . . it's not about that," X sputtered. Sam gave him an 'oh really look'. X glanced at his watch in a nervous attempt to find an excuse to get away. It was nearing nine o'clock. He should probably head back home anyways. "Oh, hey. I've gotta leave. Doc– erh- my guardian doesn't want me to stay up too late." Then X remembered Arcadia High and realized mentioning that might cover up his nervousness more. "And by the way. I was just enrolled into Arcadia High earlier today. My guardian's been pretty busy lately and I haven't been able to learn much from him. The work load isn't going to clear up anytime soon, so I guess I'll see you at Arcadia high sometime soon."

All four looked extremely happy at that news.

"That's great!" Tony said. The other three nodded in confirmation. X internally sighed in relief at their acceptance.

After talking a little bit more, he waved goodbye to the group of friends with a smile, but as he walked through the emptying hallways, he struggled to maintain the positive aura.

Sam's words echoed in his head along with his father's.

 _His feelings are artificial no matter how human he is._

 _That's why I'm afraid that mankind is not quite ready to accept you._

 _They're not genuine feelings, they're fake._

 _They might very well view your limitless evolutionary potential as something to be feared. The name X also carries connotations of danger._

 _X isn't a quantum leap above anything. He's just a computer that was programed to respond to things differently. There's nothing human like about him._

No, he could never reveal his true nature to his friends. It wasn't even a good idea for him to be in school. But he had already promised Doctor Cain that he would go. Perhaps a few months wouldn't hurt. But after that, he would have to leave.

X was silent as Doctor Cain drove them back to his house, Fredrick singing a random tune in the back. X noticed Doctor Cain giving him a few concerned glances, but he ignored them.

 _If not to be human, what was I built for?_ X thought. _Ever since I was awakened, no even before that, people were telling me that I was designed to be human and communicate like a human would. If Sam was right and robots mean nothing but danger, why am I here? What was Doctor Light's purpose?_

He felt his eyes grow hot and heavy and he turned to face the window. He hadn't even been aware that he had the ability to cry, but this revealed a new part of him that he wasn't sure he liked. It seemed that he was weaker than what everyone else had made him out to be.

"X, what's wrong?" Doctor Cain asked, sensing the android's dismay. Fredrick fell silent when he realized that X was in distress. He had realized that the android was quiet, but he had thought nothing of it until Doctor Cain spoke up.

X was very tempted to say that nothing was wrong, but that would have been lying and after everything the archeologist/scientist had done for X, he didn't deserve being lied to. "I don't know Doctor Cain. I ran into the four again and one of them, Sam, mentioned a few things that've been making me doubt myself I suppose."

"If I may ask, what did she say?"

"Well, she," X hesitated, processor scrambling to put the right words together in its distressed state. "She doesn't know that I'm X. None of them do and we . . .we met in the mall by some crazy stroke of luck and well, the subject was brought up when Tony saw my shirt. He basically asked if I'd seen X and what he was like and what not. Naturally, I didn't tell them the truth, but I didn't really lie either. Sam . . . she mentioned that her great grandparents were killed by some of my older siblings and her family has hated robots since. She . . . expressed her distaste for them and voiced her opinions on X . . . me."

"And?" Doctor Cain prodded. The news really wasn't all too shocking. Many people had been killed when had unleashed the program altered robot masters onto innocent cities. After a while, the world had truly hated the robot masters. It really wasn't very surprising to find that one family's hate had carried on through a few generations.

"Doctor Cain . . . are my feelings artificial?" X asked, turning to the old human. Doctor Cain tensed slightly and thought about it for a moment.

"If we are speaking in terms of organic or inorganic then yes, but if you really think about it, then the answer is no, _scientifically_ speaking, and that's only if we're taking about the composition and chemical makeup of your head. That's not taking into account the fact that you're more human than any robot ever created before and you're a quantum leap above anything this world has ever produced in the way of technology. X, if we just think about the _way_ that a human's head works and the way that your head works, it's really the same thing. It's just electricity and compounds and chemicals all working together to record things and react to different situations. They're both the same. They do the same thing, granted, _your_ brain is quite a bit smaller and more efficient than a humans, but that's not the point."

"So no X, you're feelings are not artificial. Because spiritually, you're your own person and your feelings are felt just like every human on this planet. You react to things differently than other people around you because you're _you_. Just like how a murderer would laugh when the cat gets thrown out the window while a cat lover would cry," Doctor Cain explained. X slowly turned to stare at the doctor for his last statement. "My apologies that was a really bad example. Can I start over?"

"No Doc, you ruined it," Fredrick deadpanned. Doctor Cain shrugged.

"The point is X. You're different and that's what makes you special. You weren't built to be a copy of some random person Doctor Light found on the street. He built you to be special, to have your own feelings, and live your own life," Doctor Cain concluded. "Now as for this Sam person, let's hope her dislike for robots doesn't cause her to hate you too because she _will_ find out. Women _always_ find out." X and Fredrick just stared at Doctor Cain oddly as the scientist drove the car into the driveway and then turned engine off.

It was when he was laying down on his bed in Doctor Cain's house that he realized that both Fredrick and Sam had predicted the coming of a virus that would turn all of the soon to be reploids crazy.

 **Author's Note: No, updates won't be near this fast, but I've already had this chapter written for a while (3-4 months) and the amount of feedback I had gotten just within the last _day_ shocked me. I decided to reward you all. I do have the next few chapters written, but after that, nothing much. I am working on it, but I've got thousands of other projects and school. Expect updates to be once a month on average. 5 thousand is a lot of words. And yeah, I know there is a lot of fluff and unrelated plot filler in the beginning. Just deal with it? There's a reason for a good portion of it that probably won't come into play for a really long time. There rest is just . . . to be honest I don't have an excuse for a lot of it, but most of it is just to give the story more flavor and make it different. **

**When will I actually get into the real plot?. . . outside of what I've posted, I'm just now finishing up with chapter 9 and I've only _barely_ started tapping into the Megaman X game plot 's a little bit more I need to get done before I really start breaking into the plot, but it will probably be really close by chapter 12. First boss should be around 15 or 16 but that's a rough guess and I haven't really planned those chapters. I should probably do that. Most of what I have planned is beyond the first and second games so I'm probably going to keep on winging it until then. Winging it as in I have somethings planned but the rest of it I just stare at the screen till its like four hours past my bed time and then write in a tired sleepy state that makes everything I put down either completely crazy or actually legit. . . . that is admittingly how I've written most of this so far, so excuse anything weird. **


	4. High School

**Author's Note: So if I were to post the completed chapters I have done now would all of you agree to not expect chapters to be produced at this rate ever again? Somebody brought up a good point about waiting to post chapters, which was something I'd been debating for a while. My main reason for waiting was to not dig myself into a production rate that I wouldn't be able to live up to and that I'd been taking my sweet time with this story lately and I really haven't looked back at previous completed chapters. I thought they were a lot worse off than they were. They weren't all that bad. Long story short, I thought there were some serious issues between chapters 4 and 5, turns out it wasn't even chapters 4 and 5, but 5 and _6_. And even then it wasn't that bad. If you don't like it, I can add something to smooth it out but basically, my memory of _all_ of the chapters I had written was flawed and because of that, I refrained from posting them because I thought they needed help. They weren't that bad at all. Ch.9, though, I will admit, has some issues. So you're going to have to wait for that one. **

_"_ _I would talk in iambic pentameter if it were easier."-Howard Nemerov_

 _"_ _It's simple, if it jiggles, it's fat."-Arnold Schwarzenegger_

Today was the first day of school, and X was terrified. He spent twenty minutes in his room fussing over his appearance which for him was a record long time.

Eventually though, he settled on his normal: a blue tee shirt covered up by a blue sweatshirt, jeans and gym shoes. He came down the stairs to find Doctor Cain and Fredrick reading the newspaper at the dinner table. X snorted in laughter at the title.

 _DOCTOR CAIN IS INSANE_

Well they weren't wrong. It just wasn't for the same reasons they were probably listing.

"Doctor Cain is insane?" X asked. "They finally figured it out eh?"

"Oh hush up you big hunk of metal," Doctor Cain snapped. X pretended to be hurt, but he had long since learned that Doctor Cain wasn't serious with his insults ninety nine percent of the time and therefore truly wasn't affected.

X laughed and sat down next to the two. "But really. What's up with the insanity bit?" he asked. Doctor Cain sighed.

"Apparently I'm being too forceful in trying to get the government to allow reploids on the assembly line. According to this article, I screamed at a government agent that reploids are not anything like the robots of the previous era and should be treated just like human beings. I remember the incident, but I do not remember my voice rising to a shout."

"Crazy people usually don't," Fredrick commented. Doctor Cain glared at him.

"Fredrick, I _will_ melt you down for scrap metal if you continue,"

Fredrick just grinned. X looked confused.

"How does shouting make it look like your insane? My understanding was that shouting was just a way of showing emotion," X asked. Cain shrugged.

"In some cases it may reveal insanity," Cain explained. "So, are you ready for school?"

X's calm demeanor shattered and a wave of nervousness hit him like a hammer to ice. "No," he responded. "I'm not sure if . . ."

Doctor Cain cut him off. "It'll be fine. I've known you were an android ever since you were reactivated and even I forget that you're robotic most of the time."

"But you _are_ like a hundred years old, Cain," Fredrick piped in.

"SCRAP METAL FREDRICK!" Doctor Cain yelled. "I'm not _that_ old yet!"

"You sure you didn't shout when talking to that government agent?" X asked with a grin. "Cause it sure does sound like you're shouting now." Fredrick laughed.

Doctor Cain glared at the two of them. "I am _so_ glad I didn't adopt a child like I almost did. At least with you two, I can turn you off."

X and Fredrick both gasped in mock terror. "You wouldn't dare," X threatened.

"Oh but I just might," Cain said, a teasing grin on his face. Then his watch beeped and he looked down at it. His eyes widened in terror as he saw the time.

"HOLY POPTARTS! Is that the time?! X, we have to go!" Doctor Cain shouted. X stood up and looked at Doctor Cain in amusement as they shuffled out of the house, grabbing a blue backpack on the way out.

"Poptarts? I wasn't aware that you had such an affinity for sweets," X commented.

"How did you think I got this belly?" Doctor Cain asked him, as he patted his stomach. X raised an eyebrow. Doctor Cain was actually relatively thin for a man of his age.

"Trust me when I say this, Doctor Cain, but you have nowhere near the belly size of Doctor Light."

"X, did you just call your father fat?!"

"Inadvertently."

* * *

On account of Doctor Cain being late for one of his many meetings he was using to promote the idea of reploid manufacturing, X  
was left alone for the entirety of his principal seemed nice enough. She looked a bit exhausted, but tried to be cheerful when X walked into her office. At first she thought X was a troublemaker that had come in for punishment, but halfway through their brief conversation, X realized this and explained that he was her new student and had just come in to get his schedule. The woman looked suddenly relieved and smiled warmly at X, apologizing and then asking him what his name was.

Why she didn't ask X his name to begin with was beyond him. She handed the android his schedules and congratulated him for getting such advanced classes. She made the comment that no transfer student had made that high of a score in math and science before and she was impressed with his scores on the entrance exams. She didn't mention the English portion.

In all reality, X had thought he had been holding back a whole bunch. It appeared that he might have needed to hold back some more. Well, he held back on everything but English. He really struggled on the grammatical and writing portion of the test. He could remember information from the reading portion just fine and his reading was fast on account of him being a robot, but the pod really didn't school him on that much and he was literally a computer. He could solve high complex problems in the blink of an eye, but his systems refused to get a solid grasp around the concept of writing sentences in an artful matter. He had tried so hard not to put down more than three four word sentences in each paragraph. He failed on one of them and had given up.

X stared down at the schedule the principle had handed him.

 _1_ _st_ _hour:_ _GYM_

 _2_ _nd_ _hour: PRECALC_

 _3_ _rd_ _hour: Computer Programming_

 _4_ _th_ _hour: AP World Government_

 _5_ _th_ _hour: AP Biology_

 _6_ _th_ _hour: English 10_

In other words, X was a genius when it came to science and mathematics. As for English? He failed. He had tested out of a language on account of him being fluent in over a thousand different languages and AP chemistry. Doctor Cain made sure to put him in AP biology. He knew that X would have enjoyed the class even though he could have passed it with ease.

The chemistry test was rather easy for X. He made a point of studying all of his biology books and Doctor Cain had insisted that in order for X to truly understand what was going on, he had to study chemistry as well.

As for the math and programming? Well, he had been working with Doctor Cain on programing for a while. The class would probably be really easy. Math came naturally as an android. He had held back some because he was enrolling into tenth grade and the fact that a tenth grader was in calculus or beyond was a little bit much. His schedule was pushing it as it was.

The principle congratulated him and sent him on his way, first hour was just about over, so he headed straight for second hour.

However, as the hallways filled with students, X realized that he had no idea where he was going. He frowned at his schedule and looked at a nearby door. Nope, he was nowhere near that location.

"HEY BLUE MAN!" a familiar voice yelled. X looked up from his paper and into the crowd, spotting Tony and Mark walking towards him. He waited until they were standing right next to him.

"It's official. That's your nickname from now on. A blue backpack? Seriously? If you were orange, you'd be blinding, but I guess since you're blue it's okay. You wouldn't happen to be a secretly skilled drummer or instrumentalist would you?" Tony asked. X shrugged.

"I've never played one so I wouldn't know," he responded.

"What's your schedule?" Tony asked. X handed him the sheet. Tony stared at it for a moment. "Wow. Lucky. It looks like you have me and Mark with you in Gym. You're stuck with me in Precalc _and_ Computer Programming. You have AP World government with Sam and Mark. Help her out would you? She complains a whole bunch about that class. You also have English 10 with her and then Nicole in AP Bio. Looks like you're really good in math and science, but you appear to fail in English. You didn't even make honors."

X huffed. In his defense, he had never actually taken an English class before.

"Don't get your pannies in a wad! It's fine. You can follow me and Mark. We know where we're going and Mark's class is just right next to ours."

X nodded. "Thanks, Tony."

"No problemo. It'll be nice to have somebody I know in Precalc. None of the others made the cut. However, you are starting like a couple weeks into class, but hey you can probably catch up really easy."

X nodded again as they began walking through the hallways. "So how have you guys been doing? I haven't really seen anybody since the second time we went to that anime shop. I've been pretty busy." Doctor Cain had X working on various programs for different robots while he was off doing management work for Cain Labs which he had neglected while he was trying to convince the world to manufacture reploids. As for the anime shop, X went the next Saturday like he promised, but he wasn't able to make the Saturday after that on account of Doctor Cain needing X for a presentation. Basically, X had to show the viewers how human he was while he had his armor on.

"Nothing much," Tony responded. "Though the couch wasn't as crammed without you."

"Nicole didn't take her spot back?"

"Nah, she insisted she would stay on the floor. It would be a lot less cramped in general if MARK HERE WEREN'T SO BIG!" Tony shouted with a smirk. Mark frowned at him and pounded a fist into his palm. He then lifted Tony and threw the much smaller boy over his shoulder. X laughed.

"My apologies, Tony. But I'm afraid you're in no condition to complain about my size. Besides, if I were to shrink, then you'd go back to being shoved in lockers," Mark reasoned.

"This is a fact," Tony agreed. "NOW PUT ME DOWN!"

"Nah, I kind of like being Santa Claus. Shall I drop you off at Victoria's desk?" Mark asked. Tony paled while X just looked confused. Seeing X's confusion, Mark explained. "Victoria is a rather largely built girl who has a serious crush on Tony. You can hear her sighing behind him all the time."

"She's not largely built! She's FAT! There's a difference," Tony stated bluntly. X hoped that this Victoria person wasn't nearby.

"ANTHONY FIZZLE! YOU BETTER NOT BE CALLING PEOPLE NAMES AGAIN!" a nearby teacher yelled. X gulped. This wasn't going to go down well. However, X wasn't aware that Tony's last name was Fizzle. It was an interesting last name that was for sure.

"NO SIR! BUT I WILL BE THE NEXT TONY STARK!" Tony screamed back.

"THAT HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH WHAT I JUST SAID!" the teacher responded. X looked thoroughly confused as Tony laughed.

"That's Mr. Hatchbury. He's our Computer Programming teacher. He's the best. is his wife. She teaches English and I think you have her too. I hear she's really cool too," Tony explained from behind Mark. " is our Precalc teacher. He's a bit of a bore, but he explains things well enough. I've never met , your bio teacher, but Nicole seems to like him. She's the only one that's ever had him. is awesome, I've had her before, but Sam just struggles in government in general so that's why she complains. And then there's . The biggest jerk of a gym teacher this school has ever seen. I swear he hates me. He loves Mark here, but he hates me. Guess what Xavier? You have him too."

X nodded. It sounded like he got mostly good teachers. He really didn't get a good feeling from . It probably didn't help that he didn't make it to his class today.

"We're here Mark! Now put me down!" Tony yelled. Mark complied and then went into his classroom with a wave to X. Tony turned to the undercover android. "Are you ready for this?"

X shook his head. He had no idea what school was like so he had no idea if he was ready for it or not. "No," he stated bluntly. Tony laughed.

"Relax. is pretty chill. I've gotten him to scream at me once and that was because I kept on making screeching noises with a bird caller beneath my desk. I don't know what happened to that thing after he took it."

X stared at Tony. Did he do stuff like that all the time? It seemed like he did. He followed the teen inside the classroom.

was a rather pudgy older man who sat as his desk, furiously typing something on his laptop. X told Tony he wanted to go talk to the teacher real quick and walked up to the precalc teacher. The man noticed X immediately.

"Are you Xavier?" he asked.

"Yes sir."

"Well, your book is right here along with a list of things we've already done. Tell me if there's anything you don't recognize or know how to do and I'll get you something to explain it to you," said, shoving a text book with a paper on top of it towards the android. X picked it up.

"Thank you."

Mr. Strider merely lifted up a hand in acknowledgement. X turned to the classroom to see that Tony was lying down across two desks, ignoring the protests around him. X walked over to him and placed his text book on a desk that Tony wasn't occupying.

"I saved you a seat," Tony said. X raised an eyebrow.

"I can see that," X stated.

Tony grinned and rolled off the desks with a thud. He then sat in the one with his backpack next to it and patted the desk next to him. X shook his head and picked up his book. He plopped down into the desk next to Tony just as the bell rang.

* * *

Tony was right. The class was a bore. But perhaps it was because he already knew all of the information and a good portion of it he was unlikely to forget due to the simple fact that his systems used some of those equations _every day_.

After looking at the list and concluding that he didn't need to bug about anything, he began to draw in boredom all over a lined sheet of paper he had found on the desk prior to him sitting at it, only paying enough attention to know that what the rest of the class was doing was something he already knew and to write down the homework at the end of it.

By the time the bell rang, he was praying that the rest of the day wasn't as boring.

He followed Tony to the next class. Dodging kids and eventually walking beside the teen as he ranted about the homework assigned in Strider's class. X shrugged. It really didn't seem like much to him. Granted, as a machine, he could probably get it done in around five minutes.

Then his motion sensors kicked in from behind him. His hand snapped up and he grabbed Tony's shirt faster than humanly possible and then pulled Tony down as he ducked. A large fist flew harmlessly above their heads.

Tony's first reaction was annoyance as he hadn't sensed the fist and thought X was pulling him down for no reason.

"Xavier, what-?!" He looked at the brunette to see him standing and turning around to face somebody behind them. Tony took a quick look behind as well to see a large boy growling at X.

"Who do you think you are!?" the boy roared in X's face.

"Xavier Light," X deadpanned, though his mind whispered a single letter. The boy blinked then grew red faced.

"Oh? You think you're tough? How will you feel when I blow your face in?!"

"How will I feel? Just fine. You?" X asked, calmly not at all feeling threatened by the large form in front of him. Tony blinked up at him in amazement.

"ARGH!" The boy swung a fist, which X dodged. The boy had predicted this and had reached out for X's sweatshirt at the same time. He grunted and picked the android up, shoving him against a wall. X blinked. He hadn't expected the boy to think that far ahead. The kid might be a fair fighter if he stopped picking on 'weaker' classmates. This wasn't as terrifying as Sam's threat if you called her Samantha, but it was definitely a level of aggression he hadn't seen in a human before.

The boy glared down at the newcomer, but inside he was freaking out. The boy hadn't budged when he picked him up, there was no sign of fear when he roared in his face or threatened to punch him. He hadn't seen a newcomer so calm before.

The newcomer was also lighter than he appeared. He had expected just about a hundred and twenty pounds judging from his build, but the boy only felt like a hundred. Which meant that he was weaker than he looked.

"H-hey Tom, just let him go alright. We're not looking for any trouble," Tony stated, trying to calm the aggressive teen down.

"CAN'T I JUST WELCOME A NEW STUDENT?!" Tom roared. X blinked again. If he had been human, Tom's volume would have sent his ears ringing for a while.

"That's not what it looks like," a familiar voice stated from behind Tom. Tom's eyes widened and he dropped X, whose movement sensors and controls kicked in and landed him gracefully on the ground. Tom turned around.

"Mr. Hatchbury, can I help you?" Tom asked.

"Yes, you can go wait in the office. I make sure to call to inform them what happened and to make sure that you actually went. Now get going," ordered. Tom shuffled away and X stood up. turned to him concerned. "Are you alright?'

"I'm fine," X responded. Tony came over to punch him in the shoulder.

"Thanks for the save man. I would've had a concussion if it wasn't for you. Though how did you see that one coming?" Tony asked. X's mind scrambled for an adequate answer. He couldn't tell him his motion sensors kicked in and he sensed the fist coming.

"Out of the corner of my eye," X lied. Tony grinned at him.

"You have some _insane_ reflexes."

X just grinned nervously as they followed to class. Once again, he sat down at a computer next to Tony and waited for the bell to ring.

came up to X and handed him a sheet of paper. "Here's everything we've covered so far. Have you taken a computer programming class before?" asked. X shrugged. He never really took a _class_ before.

"Sorta. My guardian taught me a bit," X responded. nodded.

"Well, we'll see how much you know. Right now, we're working on programming a short game. Tony can help you if you need it. He's quite skilled at this sort of thing."

Tony grinned as he seemed to swell with pride. gave X a smile and then went to his desk, to work on something on his laptop. A few more students trickled in through the door and the bell rang.

"Welcome. I'd like to let you know that Xavier here has joined this class for the rest of the year. Please welcome him," said, gesturing to X. X gave a small wave to the stares he received from the rest of the class.

"Ain't that the new kid that nearly got pummeled by Tom?" X heard a voice behind him mutter. He sighed. It seemed he was already earning himself a reputation.

"Alright, so today you guys will be continuing to work on your projects. If you have any questions raise your hand and I'll come. Tony, you help Xavier."

Tony nodded. Then, as the class began filling with noise, he turned to X. "So we're using Eclipse. It's a program you use to make other programs."

X nodded. He had heard of it. Had he used it? No, he found Cain's program to be much more effective.

He let Tony guide him through the basics, but when Tony let him begin and actually start his own project, he took one glance at X's screen and then glared at the undercover android.

"You already know how to do this don't you," he asked. X gave him a sympathetic look.

"Yeah."

Tony then glanced at X's screen again and frowned. "I've never seen a movement sequence done that way before. It's interesting."

"It'll work won't it?" X asked. It had worked for him before. Tony nodded.

"Yeah, it'll work, but it almost seems like you're arming the program with an antivirus at the same time," Tony muttered. "See this here?" He pointed to a sequence on the screen. "That has nothing to do with the sprite's movement. In fact, it seems to be like a protection against viruses. So why is it there? And what's with the rest of this? I don't quite understand it. I think it'll work, but I'm not sure. You have a weird way of programming."

X frowned. He had always programmed like that. Doctor Cain had never said anything about it when he looked at X's programming skills before. He resolved to ask Doctor Cain about it later.

Government passed by without any bumps. was eccentric to say the least. She was very passionate about her job and didn't seem to mind making a public embarrassment of herself. The class loved her and respected her at the same time. X had the feeling he would enjoy the class.

or N2 as he preferred to be called (his first name was Nick), was also very passionate about his job. Nicole seemed to like him. had no problem talking about subjects that would make normal teenagers squirm in discomfort. By the end of the hour, X was slightly concerned about the man's mental health. However, the man knew what he was doing and seemed to have a particularly strong passion with plants. X could relate.

And then came the hour that X had been dreading all day. English. While Mark had told him that was a great teacher, he couldn't help but be afraid that she would dislike him for being so much better in all of the other classes. He took a seat next to Sam just as the bell rang.

, who had been sitting out in the hall on a rolling chair, rolled across the room and nearly ran into her desk. The chair had been raised up all the way and finding discomfort in the height, lowered the chair with the lever, bouncing up and down as she did. A few of the students in the room laughed at her antics.

then addressed the class. "Good afternoon! As some of you may know, we had a new student. Xavier Light. I think that's him over there. Give a wave for us will you?"

X waved and smiled. "You joined the class at the perfect time, we're not in the middle of anything. I can get you caught up later. Can you read?"

X looked at her funny and nodded.

"Then I don't think you need to read anything for me. Just don't tell the others," said with a grin.

"Mrs.H. You just about announced that to the entire class!" Sam exclaimed. frowned, but didn't seem to be very serious about as there was a twinkle of mischief in her eyes.

"Did I? My apologies. Why should the rest of you be concerned though? Are you all trying to guilt me into less work to make up for it?"

There was a chorus of yesses coming from just about every student in the room. pouted.

"This is all because I made fun of you yesterday isn't it Sam?" Hatchbury said. Sam grinned and shrugged. "Well then, we might as well get started then." There were a few groans, but X could tell that none of them meant it.

"Xavier! Would you mind helping me pass out books?" Hatchbury asked as she stood up from her chair and patted a large box on her desk. X blinked, but then shrugged as he stood up. Sam snickered from beside him and he heard a soft 'goodluck'. X was thoroughly confused.

He went to take a few books out but slapped his hand and pushed him into her chair. X's confusion rose as she handed him the box.

"Alright, your job is to pass out as many books as you can to people as I push you, deal?" X blinked as he nodded. Wait, _what?!_ X grabbed a few books in his hand as started pushing him and the chair rolled forward, far too fast for X to be able to pass out the books. As he was pushed down the first column of desks, he managed to give books successfully to all of four people, the other seven in the column he completely missed. X grinned as the people around him laughed. His systems had already determined the event as an attempt to get him integrated in the class. rolled him around the room once and then stopped. She gestured for X to stand up, who was still highly confused.

"Not bad for the first time," congratulated. "You may sit down now. Somebody else will have to give you one later. Who's next?"

Just about the entire class had their hand in the air. picked a rather eccentric boy who screamed 'I got this!' while sitting down. The boy fared no better than X and leaned forward the chair too far. The chair tipped and sent the kid and box of books sprawling. It nearly sent the teacher to the ground as well. The class burst into laughter for a while as picked up the last few books.

"Alright, who doesn't have a book yet?" she asked. Just about half of the class raised their hands. She handed the required book out by hand. X stared at the cover as the book was pressed into his hand. _Of Mice and Men_ stared up back at him. His systems immediately identified it as a fiction novel.

"Please turn to chapter one and we'll start reading out loud. As usual, I'll read first, but if any of you want to take over, just raise your hand."

The rest of the class was entertaining. Kids spoke in different voices when they were called on, sometimes causing the entire class to break down laughing.

When the bell rang and the class ended, X concluded that he liked school. Sam dragged him out of the classroom as soon as the bell rang. They joined Mark, Tony, and Nicole outside of the school and began making their way to the buses.

"So Xavier, what do you think of school so far?" Tony asked.

"It's different that's for sure, but in a good way. I think I like it," X stated. Tony shook his head.

"That's 'cause you're a genius," Tony commented. "School work is no problem for you." He grinned at X's questioning glance. "I hacked the school. You did amazing in everything but English."

X winced. "Yeaahhhhhh."

"Relax dude. You've still got us beat in all the other subjects."

"How good did he do?" Mark asked.

"He could basically ace precalc with a little bit of touch up. Not to mention he's an Albert Einstein when it comes to science," Tony said. Mark whistled.

"Is it really that surprising that he's smart? He works at Cain labs remember?" Sam commented.

"Good point," Mark said. They stopped once they reached the bus.

"Xavier, are you taking the bus?" Tony asked. X shook his head.

"Nah, my guardian will probably pick me up soon," X said. Tony, Mark, and Nicole climbed onto a bus.

"Are you going to tell us who your guardian is?" Sam asked as she walked backwards up to the bus still facing X. X shrugged.

"He's old, but he prefers to keep on the low profile," X answered. Sam sighed as she climbed onboard.

"See you tomorrow then Xavier!" Sam yelled. X waved and began walking away as the bus began moving in the opposite direction.


	5. A Warning from an Agent

_"_ _In the end, it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years."-Abraham Lincoln._

X hummed to a tune as he began the journey back to Cain's house. He jumped when his phone vibrated in his pocket. He turned the small device on and stared at the screen for a second, before putting the device to his ear.

"Doctor Cain?" X inquired. "Is something wrong?"

" _I need you to teleport to the labs real quick. I know it's rather sudden but you know I've been trying to convince the government that reploids are worth producing. And well, there's an agent waiting here to meet you. I think she made sure we were unprepared for her, just so that she can make sure our answers are genuine. Please come over as soon as you can, alright?"_ Doctor Cain asked. X hummed in response.

"I'll be over soon, but I need to find someplace I can teleport without being noticed."

 _"_ _Okay. See you soon then."_

X hung up and glanced around. There was a Taco bell nearby. That would do.

He stepped into the building and headed straight for the bathrooms. He glanced around the stall filled room as the door shut gently behind him. His scans didn't pick up any life forms. With a sigh of relief, blue energy gathered around him and he suddenly vanished in a flash of blue light and a whistle like noise.

He rematerialized in Cain labs, the air whistling around him again. Cain had described it as a 'boo-wip', but X never heard it, considering he was either dematerializing or rematerializing at that point. He glanced around the labs and saw a woman in a black suit and tie staring at him in disbelief next to Doctor Cain.

"X! How was school?" Doctor Cain asked. The woman's mouth parted slightly, but she recomposed herself a split second later. X shrugged.

"Rather easy and enjoyable," X coolly responded as he threw his backpack up on a desk.

"Hold on a second. Is this or is this not X, Doctor Light's last creation?" the woman asked looking X over in disbelief. Dr. Cain hummed an affirmative. "Where's the blue armor?"

X's armor materialized around him in a flash of blue light. The woman blinked at him in shock.

" _You're_ X?"

"Yes?" X answered, a bit confused as to why she was so disbelieving.

"I was expecting something a bit more, oh I don't know, weaponized. You _are_ Doctor Light's last creation and last surviving robot. I expected him to put a bit more defenses on you. Heck, even your armor's not as thick as I'd imagined. How much do you weigh?"

"57 kilograms. Or just about 125.4 pounds," X responded. "I'm a bit lighter though without the armor." The woman stared at him in disbelief. X concluded that the woman was the agent Doctor Cain had mentioned.

" _HOW?!_ You should be made out of metal!" the agent exclaimed. X shrugged.

"I am. I'm mostly made out of titanium, which is why I'm so light. I was designed as a human interface, to interact and communicate with humans. It's only logical that I was made as human like as possible."

The woman shook her head in disbelief. "Amazing. And why are you going to school? Shouldn't you already know everything?"

X shrugged. "Like I said. Human interface unit. It's a part of who I am."

"List the parts and their functions that are inside of you," the agent demanded, still trying to wrap her head around how human like the robot before her was.

"Well, in the way of armor parts. There's my interior skeleton, which is a reactive super-flexible armoured skeleton which reduces 93 percent of damage. My body skin is a lightweight "Titanium-X" alloy which also has infused solar panels so that I can charge in the light. As for head parts, there's obviously my processors and the I.C. chip or integrated circuit. Basically it's my personality or 'soul'. Then there's the broad-range eye camera which lets me see at a far higher "frame rate" than that of a human's and the ultra-sensitive voice recognition system which lets me hear a far broader spectrum of sounds than the normal human ear can. Then there's my voice, which was made by HAYATOM Inc."

The agent blinked.

"Then there're the body parts. The accumulative energy generation device stores solar energy. Its primary power supply generates both the necessary energy to fuel all of my systems, and enough for a secondary supply that can be used in areas where collecting solar energy becomes impossible. The ultra-compact fuel tank is a large quantity of (Micro-Fusion) fuel that is stored in an ultra-compact tank, in order for me to be active when in dark places- such as underground or underwater. This becomes my power source if my accumulated solar energy runs out. The central control system is basically my second "brain", the I.C. chip being the first, which controls the exact movements of my whole body. Oh, and there's an auto repair system."

The agent nodded.

"In my arms, there's the X-Buster or the Mega Buster Mark 17. It's my most powerful weapon. It converts solar energy into a high powered beam. The energy amplification device amplifies stored energy to release a more powerful charged shot. Then there's the variable weapon system. I can use weapons or systems copied from other robots or Reploids through some unknown process. Megaman had that as well, but I think mine's a bit different. I haven't really tested that out yet though."

The agent kept on nodding.

"Lastly, there's my legs. The full auto balancer or Gyroscopic stabilization system enables me to land cleanly in any area, from any kind of state."

The agent nodded one final time and then spoke. "This is why I'm a government agent and not a mechanic. Anything else?"

X glanced at Doctor Cain who nodded. X gulped nervously. The X-Buster was powerful by itself. It would give the agent plenty to worry about. He didn't want to mention why he was named the way he was.

"Well, sort of. The reason Doctor Light named me X is because it stands for a variable. I have unlimited potential. It's called the X-Factor. We're not even sure _how_ it does what it does. All we know it that it _does_ it."

The agent looked thoroughly confused.

"Essentially the X-Factor is a bit like the Auto repair system. If there's a problem, it fixes it. However, nothing has to be broken. If I'm faced with a problem that I can't get through the first time, the X-Factor will make it so that I _can_ the second time. It _upgrades_ me after each challenge. It's like a human getting stronger over time after working out every day or better yet _evolution_. It's sort of like that song, 'what doesn't kill you makes you stronger'. . . I can't turn it off and I don't even know how it figures out how to upgrade me. All I know is that it uses nanites to build or alter the parts inside of me and it shuts me down while it does so. So I don't know _exactly_ what happens, but if the upgrade's not extremely important and I react fast enough, I can delay the upgrade for a couple of hours. It does scream at me to do things sometimes too."

The agent frowned. Doctor Cain decided to speak up as well.

"It's like that for just about all of X. There's not much we understand about him. Doctor Light made sure that if anyone were to take X apart, they would discover _nothing_ of importance. You open him up and his parts look like normal robotic parts, but they function _far_ more efficiently than normal parts. We don't know if the X-Factor will change that and make it obvious that X is far more advanced, but we do know that a good portion of X's strength and abilities will forever be hidden to our eyes. This set up prevents us from copying him, even just his core programming. That much we understood from his programing," Doctor Cain said.

"His programming? How much of that do you understand?"

"About ten percent for sure. There's another sixteen percent that we're iffy on. The rest is like looking at an alien language. What we do understand is sprinkled throughout his entire programming. It doesn't give us much of an understanding of what's going on inside of him. However, it does give us a good understanding of how to go about creating an android like mind. In other words, X, I don't understand. _Reploids_ , however, I do."

The agent frowned. "So to even you X is a mystery."

Doctor Cain nodded. "But I'm not trying to put _androids_ on the assembly line now am I?"

The agent smirked at him. "No sir, I don't think you are."

X frowned. Doctor Cain was acting like he didn't see reploids as androids. Yet, Doctor Cain had said that X was more human like that any robot he had ever seen. Did that mean that Doctor Cain didn't consider reploids to be very human like?

"While X still acts far more like a human than a reploid ever will, reploids are still capable of human like emotions and responses. Or in other words, reploids act human, but X acts even more so."

The agent nodded and thought for a moment.

"Reploids, they're stronger, faster both physically and mentally, and they don't require nearly as much sustenance or sleep. Say for instance a reploid were to battle a human, the reploid would win yes?"

Doctor Cain nodded, but wasn't really happy on where the situation was leading.

"So we don't want any reploids going rouge or killing anybody. . . Can reploids be affected by viruses?"

Doctor Cain frowned and slowly began answering the question, choosing his words carefully. "That is another difference between reploids and X. You see, as far as we know, X is completely immune to viruses. We subjected him to every Trojan, malware, or virus out there. We even had professionals create a few. And yet, X has never been affected any of them. He appears to be completely immune."

"And X was okay with this?" the agent asked. Doctor Cain shrugged.

"It was a necessary evil, besides it never affected him," Doctor Cain responded, unconcerned with the fact that his actions could have harmed X's wellbeing. The agent sighed and muttered something about scientists. "To answer your question. Yes, reploids can be affected by viruses just like any computer. That's why we equip each and every one of them with an antivirus specifically designed for their programming."

"The antivirus, does it prevent the virus from harming them?"

"So far yes, we've yet to encounter a virus that completely shatters the anti-virus's defenses and affects the reploid's programming. There's a few that came close, but those merely mimicked a human cold and the reploids soon recovered."

X frowned. He had been unaware that Doctor Cain had been doing such a thing.

"So these reploids, can I meet a few of them?" the agent asked. Doctor Cain nodded and the two began shuffling out the door. X moved to follow them, but Doctor Cain motioned for him to stay put. X plopped down in a nearby seat and began working on his homework.

X finished soon after Doctor Cain and the agent walked back into the room, talking about the steps needed in order to manufacture reploids. He glanced at his internal clock. They had been gone for only an hour. X placed his work back inside his bag and watched the two humans converse.

"That's it? I figured there would be something far more complicated to their construction," the agent commented.

"Reploids aren't as advanced as X and we didn't want to scare anybody with something too advanced in the beginning," Doctor Cain explained. The agent nodded in silent agreement. She glanced at X for a moment, looking as if she was debating something. She then turned to Doctor Cain as she seemed to make up her mind.

"Doctor Cain I was wondering if I could take X into town with me. I would like to see his human interface abilities in action," the agent asked. Doctor Cain frowned.

"I'm afraid that's not possible. X has been gone all day, and I was hoping on getting his help in finishing a new mailing droid," Doctor Cain responded. X frowned. He thought they finished that project weeks ago. The agent noticed his confusion.

"Oh, I'm sure you can hold that off for a bit longer. Besides, I'm sure us humans would be grateful for you letting us keep our jobs for one more day," the agent responded coolly. A tension formed rapidly in the air between Doctor Cain and the agent. X blinked. What had happened while they were gone?

"Mrs. Carson, I do not think that would be wise." Doctor Cain was cut off with the agent's next sharp comeback.

"Not wise? Why are you hiding him from the world, _Cain_?" she spat his name out and Doctor Cain frowned at her. "If he's as socially capable as you claim him to be then why are you placing him under a _false_ _name_ at the school _and_ in Cain labs for when he's in his more human form? Do you not want the world to see him for what he truly is? How do I know that he's truly an android and not one of your _replicated_ androids that you seem to be so fond of? I need proof, Doctor Cain, that X truly is as human as you claim and he needs to be far away from you when I do."

Doctor Cain glared at her. X jumped in before the situation got out of hand. He could _feel_ the tension in the air. It was thick enough to cut with a knife.

"Doctor Cain, it's fine. We finished that Mailing Droid last week, remember? I'll be fine. I'm not completely defenseless. Besides, this might boost a more positive reaction to reploid manufacturing," X soothed. Doctor Cain glared at X and then sighed loudly.

 _"_ _Fine_ ," he snapped. X winced at the sudden harshness. Doctor Cain saw this and relaxed a bit in an effort to ease some of the android's distress. "Just don't be out too late." He glanced at the agent. "I expect that he'll be back home by eight and no later."

X was confused. Doctor Cain let him leave whenever he wanted before and even encouraged it. What was different now? Why were the agent and the scientist so hostile towards each other? What happened while they were gone?

X shook his head and followed the agent out of the room, his azure metal boots clanking against the white tile. He glanced at the agent who appeared to be silently fuming. The agent appeared to be reserved, but there was a quiet fury in her eyes. He was tempted to ask what happened while they were gone, but he resolved to asking what was wrong. He opened his mouth to ask but his question died on his lips as the agent shook her head.

"Sorry X, can I call you X?" the agent asked. X nodded. "Look, I know you're curious, but it's probably for the best that you don't know."

X sighed and relented. "Alright." They were quiet for a while as they walked towards the exit of Cain labs, the only sound was the echo of metal against tile with each step X took. Then the agent gasped. X glanced at her in concern.

"I just realized I never told you my name. Cain said it earlier, but a proper introduction is in order. My name is Carson. Or Agent Carson. Or Agent C," the agent introduced, holding out her hand and smiling at the android. X smiled back and shook her hand.

"X," he said simply. Carson led him out of the building and too a small black car parked in a lot. He motioned for him to get in. X frowned. He never had to get in a car with his armor on before. That's when a question he should have asked a long time ago aroused in him mind.

"Um, should I be wearing my armor?" X asked. Carson nodded.

"I want to see how you interact with people who _know_ you're an android. Can you fit in the car though?" X's boots were three times as wide as normal boots and just about twice as long. Foot space would be a problem.

X opened the passenger car door and looked at the seat. Carson didn't object to him getting in the front, so X moved the seat back as far as it would go and gently slid in, careful not to scratch anything with the metal bottoms of his feet. Carson smiled at the sight of the android trying so hard not to damage the car.

"Relax, it's a government owned car. It's not even mine. Do you realize how many agents' cars get blown up in a week? Most of the time nobody gets prosecuted for it either. Scratching the interior is a mild offense. Nothing will happen because of it."

X relaxed some at this as he debated putting on a seat belt. He was coated in inch thick titanium. Did he really need the seat belt?

"Don't bother with the seat belt. We're just going to town and I doubt the police are going to pull us over when you're obviously inhuman," Carson stated. X briefly wondered if she was a mind reader. "And no, I don't read minds. I was trained to interpret people. If you're really as advanced as Cain claims you to be, then you are no different."

X couldn't help but wonder again if she had telepathic abilities. The car roared to life as Carson turned the key and drove it out of the parking lot and onto the road. It didn't take long for the vehicle to be driving through the city.

"This is a government owned car yes? Why does it still have wheels?" X asked. It had been curious as to why the vehicle was an older model and not a newer hovering version.

"It's more of a cover and a precaution. This car can fly, but I prefer the old fashioned approach," Carson replied, she then pulled into a parking lot, squeezing into a slot between two large SUVs. She stepped out of the car to pay the timed parking device while X struggled to get out of the car without damaging either vehicle. X grumbled as he carefully side shuffled between the two vehicles and came to stand next to the agent.

"That was done on purpose wasn't it?" X grumbled. Carson merely grinned at him. X sighed and followed the government agent onto the sidewalk. People stared at him in awe and parted to let the two of them pass. X sighed sadly.

"What's wrong?" Carson asked. "Don't you like the attention?"

"No," X responded. "I just want to be seen as an equal. I don't want to be looked down upon as something less, but I also don't want to be revered as a god."

"Huh." Carson studied X briefly before suddenly dragging the android into a store. It was a shoe store. X obediently followed the agent through the aisles all the while wondering why they would be in a _shoe_ store.

Carson picked up a pair of brown leather boots. "Do you think these will fit you?" she asked. X glanced down at the large boots that covered the lower half of his legs. There was no way the leather boots, while large for a human, would _ever_ be big enough to cover the large metal boot that covered X's entire leg below the knee.

X looked up at Carson and gave her a 'seriously' type of look. "No, I think they'll fit just fine. My boot's only five times bigger," X said sarcastically. Carson blinked before chuckling a bit. The level of sarcasm from the android was unexpected.

"I suppose that wouldn't work. Oh well." Carson shoved the confused android out of the building, civilians scrambling to get out of the way. Carson had her hands on X's shoulders and he was forced to walked backwards. Surprisingly he didn't even trip once, even when Carson forced him over the step at the store's entranceway. X muttered a few apologies after Carson let go of him (she had forced a few people to step to the side) and began walking away. X walked slightly faster for a bit to catch up.

Carson looked at the mechanical being beside her as he carefully walked around people who had stopped in the middle of the sidewalk to stare at the blue armored android. X was annoyed, but he didn't show any hostility to any one of them. Carson couldn't blame them; it wasn't every day you saw an android, not to mention one that was built _a hundred years ago_ , walking through the streets.

With a chuckle, she veered off to the side and stopped before a crosswalk. Vehicles of all sorts were currently driving past at ridiculous speeds, quite a few of them were floating. X paused next to her and shifted uncomfortably under the stares he was getting from the humans around him.

"So how are you liking being famous?" Carson asked with a smirk. X glared at her.

"It's just _peachy_ ," X muttered. Carson chuckled again.

"Were you programmed with a sarcasm chip?" Carson inquired. X shrugged.

"I hardly even know half of the things I was programmed with," X responded. "But I don't think so. There's a scientist back at Cain Labs who's incredibly sarcastic. I spend a lot of time with him; he's been teaching me a few things."

Carson nodded but then blinked when X's words sunk in. Wait . . . it was possible that X _learned_ the sarcasm from somebody else? And unlike most other A.I. programs of today, this was _true_ sarcasm. X responded to variables like a human would. Most other programs that were programed with sarcasm or learned it on their own used it at times when it was completely unnecessary or didn't make any sense at all for the situation. And that was only for the few A.I. that were _capable_ of sarcasm. There quite a few that were not capable of ever being sarcastic.

X was different. That was plainly obvious from the moment Carson met the android. The way he responded to stimuli almost made her wonder if X was really just a human soul in a metal body.

As the crosswalk light turned green and she began making her way across, Carson realized that X was possibly one of the most dangerous beings on the planet. A being that could _blend in_ and not be discovered, while having physical capabilities that surpassed any human. A being that could blow apart buildings and take a bullet without much damage. She had read the stories of X's predecessor. She knew of the true power behind the buster hidden in X's arm. The copying abilities. The charged shot.

And X's armor which was made out of titanium. Incredibly strong for its weight. The ideal substance for creating any human like robot. In battle though, it could also prove to be an advantage. The titanium would allow for more flexibility and speed, not to mention an easier repair job.

And none of that was mentioning the X-Factor. The ability to evolve over time had been unheard of before. Given time, X could become the most powerful being in the world, and arguably the universe. He had the potential for it.

Unlimited potential. It was a scary thought. If X became a sort of criminal, he could be unstoppable. And if they didn't take X out quickly, then there would be no stopping him. Carson hopped that it would never come to that.

There was a small worn down park on the way to Carson's destination. There were less people around and X had relaxed as the number or stares from people decreased. A young dark skinned boy no older than nine sat on a rusty swing in the park, head down and staring sadly at a basketball as he rolled it under his feet. X glanced around. There were no parents nearby or any other kids. The child was alone.

Carson glanced in the boy's direction, but otherwise paid the boy no extra heed. X stopped and stared at the kid who obviously wasn't happy with his loneliness. He glanced at Carson who had continued on without him a little ways. Making up his mind, X walked through the park. Carson and wherever she was leading him to could wait.

X sat down on the swing next to the boy who looked up at him in shock and amazement. He gave him a comforting grin.

"Do you play basketball?" X asked, gesturing to the ball under the boy's feet. The boy nodded.

"Yeah, but I mostly just play by myself. Nobody really comes here anymore except my friends, but they're all busy. The other kids all go to the fancy new playgrounds."

"Why can't you go to the fancy new playgrounds as well?" X asked. The boy shrugged.

"You need parents to go to those playgrounds. Mum and da are always busy with something."

The boy looked back down at his basketball, it was new and hardly used. Perhaps the boy had gotten it as a gift, but hadn't used it. Games get old fast when you don't have anybody to play with.

Carson stopped and turning around soon after the clank of X's boots on the cement stopped. She found him talking to the boy she saw earlier sitting by himself. Carson walked closer as to hear more of their conversation.

X frowned and then rubbed the back of his head even though the helmet covered up all of it. He gave a sheepish grin to the boy.

"I'll let you know that I've never played basketball before. You're going to have to teach me," X stated. The boy looked up at him, eyes wide in amazement. A moment later, his face broke out into a huge grin.

"You're gonna-?" the boy started. X nodded.

"It doesn't hurt to try something new, but I might suck at this like I do ping pong," X warned. The boy raised an eyebrow.

"Ping pong?"

X frowned as he glanced at the boy. "It's harder than it looks," X muttered. The boy grinned and stood, holding out a hand.

"I'm Timothy!" the boy greeted. X smiled and shook the boy's hand.

"Call me X," X said. Timothy nodded and ran out onto the cracked basketball court nearby, joyfully bouncing the ball on the cement. X glanced at the agent who was leaning against a pole on the slide. "I'm just gonna . . ."

Carson shook her head and made a shooing gesture with her hand. X grinned and ran to catch up with the boy. His feet clanked loudly against the cement. Timothy blinked and stared at X's feet.

"Metal?" Timothy asked. X sighed and nodded. He should have known that this was coming. "And here I thought you just dressed strangely. . . . You dress _really_ strangely."

X sighed and once again went to rubbing the back of his head. "Yeah, um, I'm X."

The boy frowned at him. "You've mentioned that."

"No. Geez how to I put this. I'm . . . not human?" X stated almost ending it like a question. Timothy raised an eyebrow at him.

"Oh really? Then what are you?"

"Android."

The boy blinked and then his eyes widened in shock. "No way. You're joshin'me." X sighed and shook his head. Timothy grinned. "I've heard of you! You're the one that they're all talking about! That's super cool!"

X shuffled his boots in discomfort. Timothy noticed this and laughed. "So are you still gonna play?"

X grinned and nodded. Soon the two started. Timothy spent most of the time showing X what to do and a few moves. Soon, they had a game rolling. Clearly Timothy was the better player, but X was getting the hang of it.

They played for a couple of hours before Timothy had to go home. Carson didn't seem to mind watching them. It was about six and they only had two hours left before X was required to be back.

X joined Carson on the sidewalk, smiling happily. They walked a little ways before Carson dragged the android into a gas station. X stared around at the various objects displayed a bit curious as to why he was dragged into a gas station. He ran off of solar energy, not gasoline. Agent Carson knew that.

He turned to see Carson handing him some sort of candy. He raised an eyebrow and looked at her in confusion.

"Eat it," Carson ordered. X shrugged and unwrapped the candy, popping it into his mouth and figuring it was probably chocolate. His eyes widened in alarm and his face twisted into disgust as he bit down on the treat though. Carson looked incredibly amused by X's expression.

He was right. It _was_ chocolate, but there was something else in it. Something evil that possessed the heavenly chocolate. It turned the entire treat bitter. Incredibly bitter. X forced the "treat" down his throat and gasped for fresh air. The taste lingered in his mouth.

"Sweet mother of all batteries! What _was_ that?!" X exclaimed. Carson looked at him amused.

"It looks like you're weak to things that are very bitter. That was a coffee chocolate," Carson explained.

"WHY WOULD THEY DO THAT TO CHOCOLATE?!" X cried. Carson shrugged.

"The taste grows on you. I'm actually a fan. You like blue right?" the agent asked. X shuddered in response to Carson's first two statements and then nodded at her last. Carson sent another amused glance in his direction and shoved a large bottle into his hand. X looked at it warily. There was some sort of icy blue liquid in the large open topped cup.

"Oh relax. That is a far sweeter treat. I'm having one too. But don't expect me to give you one of these things ever again. I'm not your mother; I'm a government agent. You want one of things again? Get a job," Carson lectured. X shrugged and took a large sip, a HUGE mistake on his part. The icy liquid chilled his systems rabidly and sent a stabbing pain up to his forehead. X grimaced and pressed a gloved hand to his forehead.

"You can get a brain freeze?" Carson asked as she watched the android grimace in pain. X shrugged as Carson chuckled. "You're not supposed to drink it very fast you idiot. Otherwise that'll happen again."

X smiled sheepishly and followed the agent out of the building passing a few teens on the way. His eyes widened as he recognized them.

* * *

Tony was having what he called a normal day. He got yelled at in gym and just about fell asleep in math. The only cool thing that happened was that it was Xavier's first day.

Xavier was cool in Tony's opinion. But, he seemed like he was hiding something. Scratch that, Tony _knew_ that X was hiding something. However, he figured that X would tell him when he was ready.

His evening was pretty normal too. Tony, Sam, _and_ Mark picked Nicole up from her abusive (in all of her friend's opinions) parents. Tony debated contacting Xavier as well, but he didn't have the strange teen's number and he was rather new to the group. He wasn't sure if Nicole was ready for somebody else to know the hardships she faced at home.

They went to the library first. Nicole went directly to the computers to type up the next chapter from one of her computers. Sam went with her to keep her motivated (really it was the opposite at times. Sam distracted Nicole more than she actually helped, but Nicole didn't seem to mind). Mark and Tony plopped down at a table to crack down on their homework. If they didn't have any or finished early, Mark would grab a book. Tony, on the other hand, would sit in agonizing silence as the evening wore on. They usually stayed there for two to three hours.

From there, they would go eat dinner either at one of their own houses or at a restaurant and then go to a nearby gas station for dessert. The station had the best slushies around and the place always seemed to cheer Nicole up.

The day turned from average to SUPER AWESOME when he passed _X_ on the way into the gas station.

Tony had immediately stopped and stared in shock as the blue armored android walked passed him, sending a small wave in his direction. He completely missed the way X's eyes widened in recognition when he looked at Tony and his friends. His mind was too busy processing the reality of what he was seeing.

Sam however, didn't. She narrowed her eyes at the advanced robot in suspicion and tensed immediately in his presence. She only relaxed when the android left, following the woman that had walked out of the station before him.

Tony snapped into fan girl mode the moment X was out of sight. "OH MY GOSH! DID YOU SEE HIM?! HE WAS AMAZING! A bit smaller than what I had originally imagined, but THAT DOESN'T TAKE AWAY FROM HIS AWESOMENESS!"

"That was X?" Nicole asked quietly, too quiet for any of her companions to her. She hadn't really noticed X's armor. She mostly just stared into the android's eyes. That's what she did with everybody. The eyes were pathways to the soul and she could determine a person's character by studying their eyes.

X's eyes seemed familiar. Like she'd seen them before. She couldn't place her finger on where though.

As they stepped into the gas station and Nicole began filling her slushie cup with the blue raspberry slush, it dawned on her. Blue. That was where she had seen those eyes before.

While she didn't notice X's armor, she did notice that he was covered in blue. Xavier had the _same_ eyes and he was also covered in blue. After that it was easy to put two and two together. Xavier was X. She was sure of it.

While she was thinking, she hadn't noticed that her cup had overfilled until Sam reached over to gently take Nicole's hand off the tab, breaking Nicole's concentration.

Sam stared at Nicole in concern. "Nicole? Are you okay?" Sam asked, gently.

Nicole blinked and then looked at the blonde. "Sam? . . . Uh. . . yeah. I just . . . I just was thinking about something. That's all."

"Are you sure? Is it something you'd like to talk about?" Nicole shook her head.

"No. . . it's not my place to tell you. This has nothing to do with my parents. I'm fine Sam really. I just . . . You know how I look into people's eyes and study them."

Sam nodded and then frowned. "Does this have something to do with X?"

"Sort of."

"Huh? Why would X have anything to tell us?" Tony asked confused as he joined the conversation. "I mean. I admire the guy, but he's an android. We're human."

Nicole shrugged and Sam stared at her in confusion. Sam knew that Nicole's observation skills sometimes made her seem omnipotent. And Nicole was _always_ right. Was there something more to X than she had originally thought?

* * *

A little over an hour later, X and Carson leaned against the guard rail on the balcony of a sky scraper, observing the chaos that was the traffic below them. The government agent reviewed the last hour in her head as she watched the android observe the world below them with a look of interest.

X proved to be every bit like what Cain had described. The android loved kids, that much was evident when Carson had to physically drag the metallic being away from where he was playing with the kids at yet _another_ park.

Also, despite his wariness to interact with humans which was probably caused by Doctor Cain's enforcement of a secret identity, X was socially adept. There weren't many people he couldn't talk to. And while the stares and open mouths unnerved him, X's natural cheerfulness managed to get the tension and awkwardness around him to drop rapidly in conversations. That and X seemed to care about what others had to say.

Carson smiled to herself. X was a good person and she doubted that he would stray from that path very easily. His innocence was blinding at times and he was _far_ wimpier than what she was used to.

Actually, no, it wasn't that X was wimpy, no that wasn't it. He was soft. Too soft. A few more years might harden him up a bit more, but as of right now, he was a little weak in the way of the mind. He had determination though, and will. But he was also far too gullible sometimes.

All in all, he was acting exactly like he should. X wasn't even a year old at this point. He had the knowledge of a professor, the mind of a teenager, but the experience of a baby. Perhaps, when those differences began evening out, he would get stronger. As of right now, X had a lot of things he needed to work on.

At this point, X could easily slip into darkness. It was rather easy to fool X. He saw the good in everybody and sometimes assumed that people were going to act like the good inside of them.

He needed to grow up.

However, despite his obvious weaknesses regarding his mental issues, Carson found that she rather liked the android. Enough that she felt the need to warn him about the true darkness that surrounded him, darkness that he was too blind to see.

"X," Carson started. The android's head turned to look at her. "There's something you should know."

X remained silent, knowing that whatever she was going to say was important and that he shouldn't interrupt.

"There are a lot of people out there that are not as nice as they seem," Carson stated. X opened his mouth to respond, but the agent shushed him. "People who would use your potential for their own benefit. People who really aren't looking out for anybody else's wellbeing except their own." Carson paused. "You have to start paying attention to things and being _cautious_. You can't trust people just because they _seem_ nice. People are more manipulative that you think."

X nodded.

"The point is X that Doctor Cain isn't who he seems. He's-," Carson was cut off by X.

"What do you mean?! Doctor Cain has taken care of me ever since I was activated!" X exclaimed.

"I know! But you can't believe that everything he says is true! He's not telling you everything!" Carson argued.

"Doctor Cain's one of the few that doesn't _discriminate_ me for being an android!"

"I KNOW X!" Carson shouted. X shut his mouth. "X, there's a fine line between _trust_ and _idiocy_. I'm not saying that Doctor Cain hasn't done a lot for you; I'm just saying that his intentions are darker than you think! He-," Carson was once again cut off.

"I TRUST Doctor Cain! Alright?! He's like a _father_ to me!" X shook his head and breathed in a bit to calm down.

"X-," Carson started, but got cut off again as X raised a hand to stop her.

"I'm heading back. It's about time anyways," X grumbled. Carson blinked as X vanished in a flash of blue, the air whistling.

Carson sighed after the light disappeared.

"You _really_ need to grow up, X."

 **Author's Note: This was an odd chapter. I'll just say that right now. It _had_ to have been really late when I wrote this because Carson came out a lot stranger than truly necessary. If I haven't mentioned this before, I, especially my writing, get a little loopy when I'm tired. I could try to do it earlier in the day, but honestly, my best ideas come to me only when I'm semi conscious. **


	6. Emerald Spears

_"_ _Laugh and the world laughs with you, snore and you sleep alone."-Anthony Burgess_

 _January 3_ _rd_ _: The new reploids have been running off the assembly line for several weeks. It's amazing how easily they have been able to adapt to even the most difficult jobs. It still is a bit odd to see them working side by side with humans, but everyone seems to be happy to accept them._ (From the Journal of Doctor Cain)

It had been a little over a month since X had started school. He had discovered that he practically knew nothing about English and grammar and had been taking extra tutoring lessons with after school to catch up. So far he didn't think that anyone other than Doctor Cain and Agent Carson whom he hadn't seen ever since he left her on the balcony, knew that X and Xavier were one and the same.

Things seemed to be looking up. Tensions in reploids working in Cain labs who had been worried about the world's acceptance towards their kind, disappeared when reploid manufacturing started at full tilt and the general populace was happy to accept them. Even Fredrick had relaxed considerably when the reploid manufacturing began and X had begun to see less and less of the reploid who had apparently gotten a job at a mailing industry and was, as he put it, self-sufficient.

X remained with Doctor Cain. Carson's worries had long since slipped from his mind somewhere in the months' time. At first, he had given her warnings some thought, but all other pondering had been shot down over time as X became even more convinced that Doctor Cain was trustworthy.

Unfortunately, though, there had been several reploid disappearances throughout the area. There had been no sign of the reploids since then and it had placed many into a state of worry. However, constant reassurances that the missing reploids probably just got too busy to report in convinced them otherwise.

X's friends only became more insistent on his devotion and attention to the group and their bonds only grew stronger. X was officially welcomed into the small band of outcasts and had spent a lot of time with them over the last month, much of it, at the library.

Nicole had insisted that X should join them more often and soon X was accompanying Sam, Mark, and Tony in the evenings, rescuing Nicole from the foul pit that was her family. When they first introduced X to Nicole's family, to say X was upset was an understatement, especially considering he had witnessed her getting a beer bottle thrown at her as she ran out the door in fear and her father figure spat out words that X knew for a fact were banned in several countries.

For the first time in X's life, he had no problem arming his X-buster and pointing it at somebody.

However, that would have blown his cover and he wasn't quite ready for that. That and it would shatter whatever trust the world had in reploids and it would be harming a human something he told himself he would try his best not to do.

It was because of this growing bond between them that X found himself walking home, next to them, late at night, after watching a ten o'clock movie. It was Sam that convinced the others to cut through the construction site in order to half their travel time and get home sooner. The night was freezing given that it was early January and they, excluding X, found it rather unbearable and wanted to get home faster. X found the temperature enjoyable because it meant that he didn't have to worry about overheating.

Just as they were passing beneath the skeleton of some sort of bridge between the two unfinished buildings deep in a rather _large_ construction site (X found the size to be alarming and wondered why the crew didn't just finish _one part at a time_ ), X's scanners picked up somebody nearby and his systems instantly went into high alert. Why his scanners didn't pick the life source up sooner, he didn't know. And that concerned him.

"Hold up guys, there's somebody nearby!" X warned. There was a soft rustle behind him and X's eyes widened. When did the life source get _behind_ him?

"That's right _reploid_ ," a voice behind him hissed. X began to turn around, but something connected with the base of his neck and his vision went black as his entire body went into a forced shut down.

Sam whirled around to face the green suited man behind them. Her eyes widened as she watched X fall to the ground with a heavy thud, the back of his neck sparking as a small piece of metal stuck out of it.

She didn't recognize the attacker. His features were partially hidden by a green bandana and a pair of sunglasses. The man had a rifle in his hand, which he slung on his back. She guessed that it was only used for stunning; either that or it only had one shot. He wore a dark green vest and pants and there was an odd emerald like badge on his chest. There was a pistol hanging in a holster from the man's belt. Sam recognized the device to be an energy gun. Energy guns were rarely allowed to be handled outside of the military or police. Before, it was only allowed in the military, but ever since reploids began manufacturing, there was an increase in police armed with energy or even rarer plasma guns, just to reassure the population that wasn't too sure of having robots walking among them. However, energy guns were still far too dangerous to be allowed in modern households. Ever since the United Countries declared world peace and unity twenty years ago there had been no need for _citizens_ to arm themselves with _that_ kind of weaponry. If a bullet wound from an energy gun didn't kill you, it would take far longer to heal then a gun with _metal_ bullets. The energy shot burned and completely destroyed any cell it came into contact with. The body would have to work around thousands of dead cells to even begin healing.

Which meant that if the man in front of her legally owned that gun, he would have to be part of the police force or military. But then, why did he shoot Xavier?

"Who are you and what do you mean reploid?! Xavier isn't a reploid!" Sam explained. Mark moved to stand protectively next to Sam and in front of Nicole. He didn't trust the man and allowed Tony to step forward to check on X. Mark's job was to look intimidating and Sam did the talking. After all she sounded far more demanding and enforcing than any one of them combined. For a few seconds, Tony seemed to panic as he ran his hands over X's wrist and neck, typical spots where one would check for a pulse.

"Sam, there's no pulse," Tony said weakly as he looked up at her. Mark reached behind him to grasp Nicole's hand to keep her from freaking out. However, she appeared far calmer than he'd expected.

"You _killed_ him?!" Sam exclaimed whirling on him in a fit of anger. While she hadn't known Xavier for nearly as long as she had the others, a friend was still a friend. And she _liked_ Xavier. There was something about him that made her feel safe despite his small size and weight.

The man laughed. It was a twisted sort of laugh, one that caused chills to run down your spine. Nicole shuddered, reminded if only for a moment of her own household.

"I'm surprised . I would have thought that since your family is an active supporter of the Emerald Spears, they would know better than to allow a _robot_ to deceive them."

Sam's first reaction was to be weirded out as she found it rather creepy that the man _knew who she was._ But then her eyes widened in shock as the rest of the man's words sunk in. "No, that's impossible. Xavier can't be a robot. He has emotions."

"Reploids were built to deceive my lady. Tell me, have you ever ranted about robots before?" the man asked. Sam froze.

"That day. At the mall. . . I insulted robots and he. . . he looked . . ."

"Hurt," Tony finished as he looked up at Sam. Sam shook her head.

"No . . . Xavier is a robot?" Sam whispered, hurt. Why didn't he tell them?

"Oh yes my dear, complete with a titanium frame and an I.C. chip. Shall I finish him off now?" the man asked. He pulled the energy gun from its holster and pointed it at X's head.

"NO!" Nicole shouted from behind Mark. The others turned to look at her.

"X-Xavier never meant us any harm. He just wanted to be like us!" Nicole said. The man laughed.

"Megaman never meant us any harm either, but his kind damn near wiped the entire planet out so he was destroyed. The same thing shall happen to this hunk of junk," the man said, kicking X's head and reaiming the gun. A soft groan emanated from X and Tony backed away from the reploid, startled. The man looked down at X in shock.

"What the hell? That's impossible! He should have been out for another hour at least!" the man screamed.

* * *

As soon as X's primary systems were forced offline, a secondary set snapped into action, scanning and assessing the damage and _what in Light's name_ had caused it. This system immediately forced thousands of microscopic nanites within X's body to _wake up_ and _fix._ It then began constructing a quick blue print of an upgrade that would prevent the problem from _ever happening again._ Its bearer had been offlined in a _hostile_ situation. That was a _big_ no no. X needed to be up and running five _minutes_ ago. The X-Factor was screaming at the nanites to _hurry up_ , because at any second X's attacker would finish him off and that was _not_ something the X-factor was willing to accept. While X's soul was the boss of everything that happened in his body while he was conscious, the X-Factor took control after he had been offlined. After all, Doctor Light had placed a threat analyzer in the system so that it would know when things were dire. And boy were things dire. Offlined, with _no armor on whatsoever_ , with a hostile in the area? The X-Factor imagined that it _couldn't possibly get any worse_.

So _of course_ X reawoke a few minutes later with his systems screaming at him and his nanites scrambling to set up a defensive shield that would prevent the electromagnetic discharge that had knocked him out earlier from _ever_ knocking him out again.

It was a quick fix, his systems told him, but it was necessary. They would make him a more permanent one later, but right now, X had to get his metallic rear end in gear and _get out_ of that nasty little situation he'd gotten himself into.

X groaned and ordered his systems to _shut up_ and stop _screaming_ at him. Why did Doctor Light build him with such a defensive little system in him? The X-Factor, he concluded, was _annoying_ when it was placed in a situation it didn't like. But, he had to admit, it sure was useful.

He forced his arms into motion and pushed himself to his feet, nearly ignoring a man's shouts beside him as he tried to sort through all the status reports the X-Factor had rather rudely shoved in his face.

"That's impossible? What the hell are you? You're a reploid right? This worked on all the other reploids we've dismantled!"

Now _that_ made X refocus on the matter at hand, something the X-Factor was very pleased with him doing. Its boss was _finally_ assessing the situation.

" _You're_ responsible for the missing reploids?" X growled. The man nodded.

"Well not just me, but the Emerald Spears! We live to free our world from the evil clutches of robot kind!" the man shouted.

"We haven't done _anything_!" X shouted.

"You _reploids_ haven't, not yet, but you soon will! The robot masters were the same way after all!"

"We're _different_! You can segregate us because of something a _completely different species_ did in the past!" X exclaimed. This wasn't _reasonable_! But then, he realized, the Emerald Spears were a _terrorist group_. They didn't have to be _reasonable_.

"You're all robots. You're not a different species!"

"Robot masters weren't designed from human interaction and replication like reploids were. They don't have the same emotional processing systems and they don't have the same _empathy_ units. It's harder for them to be human because they weren't designed like that! Reploids are designed with the ability to think, act, and _feel_ just like a human!"

"Why does that matter? And what are you? Like I said, that worked on all the other repoids. You spoke as if you _weren't_ a reploid. Now I'll ask again _reploid_ , _what are you?"_ the now identified terrorist growled. X blinked as the anger in him dissipated as he was faced with a new challenge, trying to admit what he was in front of a group of people he had been _hiding from_ for the past couple of _months_.

"I, uh . . ." he started. He heard a shuffle behind him and turned to see Tony looking at him as he got to his feet with his mouth open in awe and amazement.

"You're not a reploid are you?" Tony asked. X solemnly shook his head. Tony grinned. "Holy crap dude! This is _so cool!"_

"Tony, what-?" Sam started. Tony turned to her.

"Don't you get it?" At Sam's confused stare, he continued. "Remember when we met X in that gas station and Nicole had that really weird look on her face and she overfilled her cup?"

"Um yeah?" Sam said.

"We're all dumbasses! Nicole figured it out way before us, and it's _so simple_. He didn't even try to hide it!"

X sighed. He really hadn't. After all, he'd used a name that started with the same letter and his father's last name. . . _And_ kept on wearing blue.

"Am I right?" Tony said, looking back at X.

"You're right," he said. Sam looked at him for elaboration. "I didn't try to hide it from you guys, I just didn't release any extra information to you. After your rant at the mall, I . . . was unsure of your reaction. So I didn't say anything."

"See?!" Tony exclaimed.

"Tony, just get to it already, you're not making any sense," Sam grumbled.

"Xavier _Light_. Oh come on! Xavier isn't a reploid! He's an-!" Tony was cut off as the realization hit Sam full force.

"Android," she muttered, her eyes widening. Frustration filled her as she realized that a _robot_ had been posing as her friend all this time.

"As much as I'd had to break this rather pitiful little revelation up, an android? Seriously? But that would mean this hunk of junk over here is . . . Doctor Light's last creation," the terrorist stated as the realization hit him as well. A soft glow emanated from X as his blue armor materialized around him.

"Surprise," X stated as he spread his arms out wide. The man raised his gun and immediately began firing energy blasts at the android who covered his face with his arms and rolled out of the way.

"What are you doing?!" X shouted. "You're going to get somebody hurt!"

"You're a menace and a threat to society! You started this whole mess by just _existing_! Maybe if I take you out of the equation, reploids won't be able to advance enough to be a problem!" The man continued to fire at X, whose armor seemed to be relatively unfazed by the blasts except for a few scorch marks and dents.

"That doesn't make any sense!" X exclaimed. There was _nothing_ more Doctor Cain could use from X's systems to advance reploid kind. X was just some sort of massive code that Cain had yet to crack. A code that was _useless_ without the solution.

Realizing that just _shooting_ wasn't working, the man switched targets, firing at the shorter auburn haired one in the front.

The attack was unexpected and Tony's reactions weren't fast enough to dodge. He cried out as pain exploded in his leg and he fell to the ground.

"Tony!" the group cried out as both Sam and Mark both reached out to their friend to catch him as he fell. Nicole whimpered in fear from behind. She'd faced guns before, but nobody she was close to had ever gotten hurt. And her father hadn't been armed with an _energy_ gun. Normal guns didn't kill as easy . . . right?

X stepped forward, face filled with concern. But the terrorist whirled on him still pointing the gun at his friends.

"Don't move! If you move, I'll shoot!" he warns. X freezes.

"What the hell?!" Sam screamed turning to face the man in cold fury. "Why did you do that?!"

"Because I didn't bring the equipment to _fight_ a 'roid. This dumb bot seems to care about you, so I figured targeting you would be easier," he explained. He turned to X, still keeping his gun trained on the four.

"Disarm your weapon!" he ordered. X blinked and held his hands up.

"It's not even _activated_!" he protested. The man growled at him.

"But you can activate it within seconds! Disarm your weapon!" he argued. His finger tightened on the trigger and X raised his left hand in a sort of 'calm down' gesture and left his right one fall to his side, limp.

There was a pop and a hiss as his lower right arm, armor and all, dislocated from the rest of his arm and fell to the ground with a clang. The man looked at him shocked.

"You can take off your arm just like that?" he asked. X sighed.

"Look, I don't know why it does that either, but yes. Maybe it's for easier maintenance?" he said. The man grinned at him and turned to the group again.

"Well I'd hate to end the life of the daughter of such loyal supporters, but I can't let anybody find out who's been doing all this so in short, goodbye," the man stated.

"NO!" X shouted. But the man didn't seem to hear him. He raised his gun which had fallen slightly in his earlier shock and pointed it at the group still frozen in fear. Sam closed her eyes when she saw the man's finger tighten around the trigger and waited for the inevitable high pitched noise of an energy gun firing and the searing pain that followed.

It came, but it was much louder and lower than what she had expected. A voice cried out in pain, but it didn't come from her. Nor did it come from any of her friends. She'd known them for years; she would know.

* * *

X stared on in horror as the man raised his gun back up and aimed it at his friends. _There's no other way that this can be solved without violence. Nothing I say can make him stop. It's a good thing he bought the act and I prepared for this,_ he thought as he raised his left hand. _My only hope is that I can do this without killing him._ There was a brief flash of blue light as his arm, everything from his elbow to his hand, glowed and morphed into a round and rather large cannon. The famous Mega Buster. Except, this wasn't a Mega buster. No, this was an upgraded version, the X Buster. _Of course_ Doctor Light named every substantial weapon or system in him after his name. 'Cause why not? He'd named his robotic twins _Rock and Roll_ after all. Besides, he built the most impressive technology for his time; he was allowed to be a _little_ corny right?

He aimed, trying to keep his arm steady without the use of his other hand and prayed that the little training he'd gotten in the pod would pay off and the fact that he didn't have a second hand to steady it wouldn't hinder him too badly. He felt the internal components in his buster heating up and priming before they let lose a devastating shot. And then, just as the Emerald Spears member tightened his finger on the trigger, X fired. A large 'pow' following with it. His arm jerked backwards as the energy shot out from the tip of the cannon at a ferocious speed. It was the first time he had fired his buster since he had been woken up by Doctor Cain. And while deep down he hoped it was going to be his last, he had a feeling that wasn't going to be the case.

The man cried out in pain as the large energy blast impacted with his hand and his gun clattered to the ground, damaged where it was closest to where the blast hit. X winced. He had aimed only for the man's gun, but it appeared that his aiming was a bit off. He grimaced as the man wailed at him.

"Monster! You took out my arm!" he screamed, turning on X who still held his buster out in front of him. The man gulped when he saw that the internal components to the buster were still glowing and that the outer rim of the gun was smoking very faintly as the internal components were hot enough to vaporize even the particles in the air. That meant that the robot in front of him could fire at any moment, the weapon was already prepped. There would be no delay this time.

"I was aiming for your gun," X muttered ashamedly. Sam and the others opened their eyes to see the man who had been trying to kill them, cradling his hand and staring at X in anger. _X shot him!_ Sam realized. _X can_ hurt _people?!_

"You took out my entire hand you faulty bot! Where the hell are your three laws?! And I thought you disarmed your weapon?!" the man screamed, his previous fear covered up and replaced with anger.

"I disarmed my right one," he said. "But I didn't trust you enough to disarm both and you seemed convinced that I only had one."

"And your three laws?!" he demanded. X hesitated.

"I . . . don't have any. . . Doctor Light thought that it restricted my free will." Sam resisted the urge to gasp. _No three laws_?! Was Doctor Light _insane_?! There was no way civilization would accept something that could potentially be so dangerous! The three laws prevented robots from harming or disobeying humans. Without the three laws, they would be allowed to do whatever they pleased. Even if it meant wiping out all of humanity.

" _You don't have any_?!" the man hissed. The group of friends watched the discussion with amazement. "I should have destroyed you when I had the chance earlier! You're too dangerous to be kept alive!"

"Look, it's not my fault that I wasn't programmed with them."

"Well, reprogram them in you then!"

"I _can't_. Not that I would want to. I'd rather not spend my days serving people like you. But _I can't get reprogrammed._ It was the way I was built. I'm completely immune to viruses. _Nothing_ inside of me can be altered by an outside force."

"Argh! I suppose you're going to kill me now aren't you?" the man asked. X blinked at him.

"Why would I kill you?" he asked, completely puzzled.

"Because you're a robot! All robots are evil and do not deserve to exist!"

"Where is all of this coming from?! What evidence do you have to back this up?!" X yelled angrily. The blatant prejudice infuriated him. There was _nothing_ that the man had said that defended his claims. It _pissed X off._

" _Evidence_? Perhaps it's because robots have taken thousands of lives in the past!"

"And yet you humans have taken _billions_ _upon billions_ of them _yourselves_! Alright fine, we've killed a few people, but that doesn't justify the extermination of an _entire_ _race_! Not to mention that most of the lives we took, we didn't take _willingly_! We can't _change_ our programming! That's one of the many things that keeps us apart from you humans. _We can't change_. We _would_ if we could. But we _can't._ And alright, we're defensive over our existence. But look at it from our perspective. We're being hated and destroyed by the very thing that _created_ us! Don't you'd think that would validate some sort of hurt, anger, and confusion?!" X paused in his rant as the humans before him looked on in shock. "We don't _want_ to be _different_. We want to fit in. We don't want to live in fear just because of something that happened _a hundred years ago_. And you know what? It wasn't even our fault. The robot masters were reprogrammed by _Wily_ , a _human_. If Wily hadn't been ordering them around, they wouldn't have laid a single finger on any human! You say we're monsters, but we're no more monsters than our _creators_! And our _creators_ are _human_!"

Sam blinked as she slowly came to realize what sort of mindset her and her parents had. It was _prejudice._ Pure and simple. Because while the surface of her mind was still following her parent's teachings, deep down inside, she knew X was right. He was _right_. Mankind had used robots as a sort of punching bag. A scapegoat to take all their anger for what Wily had done out on. And they had _exterminated them_. Megaman, the world's robotic _hero_ , had been executed because of it, the other robot masters disappearing soon after.

And yet Doctor Light still hadn't given up. Here was his last creation, standing before her, slightly banged up because he was trying to _save her life._ And here she was being an ungrateful little snob and _hating_ him for trying to be her friend.

X _was_ her friend, she realized. He had not done _anything_ to harm any of them in the past few weeks. Nicole _trusted_ him and Nicole barely trusted _anybody_. She had known X was a robot for _weeks_ now and yet she still trusted him. Not to mention that X was far more human that any robot she had ever heard of. Her parent's claim that robots didn't have any emotions was incorrect. Sam could still recall the hidden hurt on X's face that day at the mall.

 _I'd better start living up to my promise to never leave those I view as friends alone then,_ she thought determinedly as she got to her feet, leaving Tony under Mark's care.

"What does it matter if we created you?! You have _betrayed_ your creators! You deserve to be destroyed!" The man picked up the gun and raised it with his uninjured hand, only to get it kicked out of his hand by an attacker from the side. He looked in shock to see Sam, glaring at him with her foot still lifted from when she used it to disarm the man.

"I'd appreciate if you'd _stop hurting my friends_ ," Sam hissed. "Because I made a promise to never leave them alone, so there's no way I'm going to let _Xavier_ face you by himself. He's too soft to do much more damage anyways."

"WHY ARE YOU PROTECTING IT?!" the man screamed at her.

" _It_ , has a name and whether it is X or Xavier, human or robot, _I don't care_ ," Sam growled giving the man a rather harsh welcoming to her fist. The man fell down with a thud, his sunglasses falling nearby. Sam turned to X and spoke before he had a chance to. "Put your arm on. It's really creepy seeing only half your arm."

X grinned at her as his buster reverted back into his normal hand and he picked up his fallen right one, putting it back into place with a series of clicks. Sam looked back down at the Emerald Spears member as he groaned and turned to face up at her.

"I should have shot you first," the terrorist muttered. "What's with this blatant defense of a _robot_? Your family knows good and well what those things can do!"

"Just because they can, doesn't mean they will. Xavier is right. Humans are just as, if not more, dangerous than robots," Sam bent down so that she was staring into the man's now exposed hazel eyes. "Besides, the Emerald Spears is a terrorist group. We're not supposed to give them what they want."

"A terrorist group that _your_ parents support," the man argued. Sam shrugged.

"I never said I agreed with their choices. Besides, they only support the destruction of _robots_. Once I tell them that you have been attacking _humans_ too, I'm sure they'll reconsider their choices," Sam said. "And since Xavier over here seems to be _so good_ at politics and convincing people, heck, I might even get them to convert to robot supporters. I can see the beginnings of a con artist in him."

"I do _not_ manipulate people like that," X grumbled.

"Hush up," Sam ordered. "Now I'm going to call the police and you're going to sit there nice and pretty." She pulled her rarely used cell phone out of her pocket and backed away from the man who dared not move with X having _both_ of his weapons and him being completely disarmed. Lifting it to her ear, she spoke.

"Dial police," she said and was silent for a few more moments before she spoke again. "Yeah we've got an Emerald Spears member here. He shot my friend and nearly killed me and a few others. Could you come pick him up?"

The man glared at her, but then stared nervously at X who had moved slightly closer. Neither one of X's busters were activated, but the threat still stood. X's reaction time was far faster and more accurate than the human. At this point there was nothing the man could do.

However, he did know that he would much rather take a risk then get taken in by the police. If he ran, his chances were just about none and the robot _might_ kill him, but he didn't care.

With that in mind, the man got to his feet and bolted, a split second later, X took off after him. He couldn't let the man get away, not when the man might harm Sam and the others later to get to him.

The man apparently knew his way better than X and had managed to squeeze through a pair of beams X wasn't expecting. The android was forced to shoot to the side and struggle through a maze of half completed cement blocks, wooden platforms, and beams. He would have done fine and caught up to the terrorist if he hadn't caught his foot on something and came crashing, rather pitifully, to the ground. Pulling, himself up and spitting out a few leaves, he tried to make up for lost time. The mistake prevented X from catching up to the man, as he was unaccustomed to traveling at high speeds through a maze of obstacles.

The runaway's luck disappeared when he hit the road. In a burst of speed, X managed to catch up and knock the man over, a bit irritated with himself for allowing the man to get so far. He kneeled on the man to keep him down and prevent him from repeating the action. It wasn't long before the police's hover cars and one ambulance, pulled to a halt in front of the duo, the bright lights causing X's optics to scramble to adjust.

Both human and reploid police officers tumbled out of their vehicles, a bit shocked as to who was currently apprehending the Emerald Spears member. The hesitation was brief though and they quickly took over for the android who informed them that there was a human that had been shot with an energy gun in the leg further in the construction site. With that being said, a first responders quickly guided a floating stretcher in the direction X pointed them to, a field doctor following behind.

A second doctor stayed behind to treat the Emerald Spears member's hand. X grimaced at the sight. While his blast wasn't strong enough to take out the man's entire hand, it might as well have been. Just about all of the man's fingers had been rendered useless; the thumb had been spared as it had been on the other side of the gun, which had taken whatever was left of the attack. What was still left of the man's fingers would have to be amputated and replaced with metal, robotic ones. X would have chuckled at the irony if he hadn't been feeling so downright _awful_ about the ordeal.

The police waited until Sam and the others had been guided out of the site and checked over for injuries. Deeming all but Tony, who was rushed to the hospital, to be okay, they allowed them to wander. Sam though, was the first to be released and she walked up to X who was sitting and holding his head on his hands on a fallen log on the side of the road, watching the chaos in front of him with a guilt stricken face.

She sat beside him and was about to speak but the android beat her to it.

"I'm sorry," he said. Sam turned to him.

"For what?"

"For not telling you guys and lying to you. . . . and for everything that's happened tonight," he answered, his voice shaking. Sam shrugged.

"It's alright. We get it. I'm still a little upset that you lied to us for so long, but it makes sense. If somebody walked up to me and told me that they were a robot, I probably would have walked away right then and there. And I if was somebody like Tony, I would have fawned over you. I get it, you didn't want the attention. Besides, you saved our lives tonight."

"But I was the one that _put you in danger_ ," X argued.

"To be honest X, I don't think any of us care. Nor do we regret ever being your friend. And Tony? Forget him. He's the happiest kid in the whole wide world right now, just because he discovered he's friends with _the_ X. Before, he would have gladly shot _himself_ in the leg just to get a chance to talk to you. Now that he knows who you are, well, you just made his day."

X smiled at the thought as Nicole and Mark were both released and they walked over to join X.

"What happened to your face?" Mark asked. X blinked. His face? He brought a gloved hand up to it and the sensors on it picked up a powdery like substance that rubbed off when he brushed up against it. Dirt.

X's face went red as he recalled the brief moment in his memory in which his face connected with the ground.

"You fell, didn't you?" Sam asked, nearly bursting with mirth. X huffed and glared at her briefly.

"I'm not used to chasing people," he grumbled.

"But you have better eyesight than us and you still fell," Mark argued. X frowned.

". . .It's dark out . . ," X countered. There was a brief moment of silence before Sam could no longer hold in her laughter. Mark and Nicole joined soon after.

"You have better senses than us and you _fell_! You got beat by a human!" she howled. X grumbled to himself and went red as a couple of police officers turned to look back at them in confusion.

"Keep it down would you?" X pleaded. Sam ignored him.

"Your face is redder than my dad's Ferrari and _that's_ saying something!" Sam teased. X continued to grumble and buried his face in his hands. "Oh come on. We're only playing X."

"I know," X replied, but still refused to show his face. Sam laughed and gave him a good pat on the shoulder. They sat in silence for a bit before a police man walked up to them.

"We can take you all home now," he said and then turned to X. "Do you have some way of getting back to Cain labs without getting targeted again? We don't know if there's more out there."

X nodded. "Yeah, I can teleport there."

After a few brief goodbyes to Sam and the others, X disappeared in a flash of blue, the signature whistle of a teleportation sounding as he did.

With a sigh of relief and exhaustion, X materialized back in Cain labs, right behind Doctor Cain, who appeared to be working overtime.

"You teleported back?" the scientist asked, not bothering to turn around as he already knew it was X.

"Yeah, I ran into some trouble," X stated. Doctor Cain frowned in confusion.

"Trouble?" The old man turned around to see X in his armor, complete with several dozen scorch marks and dents. " _Trouble?!_ X! Those are the marks of an _energy gun_!"

"Yeah, I ran into an Emerald Spears member," X explained. Cain's eyes narrowed in thought.

"Emerald Spears, eh?"

"Yep. . . it turns out that they were the ones responsible for the missing reploids."

Cain paused and stroked his beard in thought. He then looked back at X.

"What happened to your face?" the scientist asked.

Once again, X recalled his chase through the construction site and his face turned an alarming shade of red.

 **Author's Note: I think I went what to fast with converting to the Sam is a robot believer bit. I don't like it, but I looked at the word count and how far I was away from getting to the real good plot and decided that moving a bit fast for a minor character was okay. It didn't bother my editor so I'm assuming it's not as bad as I see it. Then again, she's not involved in the franchise so she doesn't have the same feels. So yes, I understand that it was entirely too fast. If it bugs you people too much, I can add another chapter between that might help, but that will require a whole bunch of moving around chapters at this point.**


	7. Mavericks and Maverick Hunters

_"_ _Do not take life seriously. You will never get out of it alive."-Elbert Hubbard_

 _"_ _I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by."-Douglas Adams_

Of course with every new thing there also came some sort of restriction. For reploids, it came in the form of a law. It was a simple law; basically stating that whoever you worked with had to know you were a reploid. That meant that if you weren't wearing your armor, you had to be carrying around some sort of id that stated you were. And if you were already a part of some sort of organization, well, you'd have to state your reploid nature in your file.

Obviously this ticked a few reploids off. The government was rubbing it in their faces that they were different.

But in all reality it _made sense_ especially for jobs that were physical. Reploids had a physical advantage over humans. Physical jobs would be easier.

However, this law also came with a price. Reploids couldn't earn as much. Physical jobs were seen to be easier for them because of their robotic nature, so employers didn't _pay them as much_. Which also ticked a few reploids off.

And then there was the food price segregation. Parts and oil were the same price as usual for either reploid or human. But _food_ was raised in price for any reploid who came to purchase the food themselves. They had to have a note saying who the food was for if they were purchasing the food for a human. _Only_ then would the prices be normal. Reploids who purchased food had to pay an extra twenty percent.

This _sort of_ made sense as it cut back on the amount of food reploids consumed for pleasure (reploids ran far better off of a normal charge, but could consume food for a less efficient energy source) but it did _nothing_ to stop the gluttony of the humans, who completely disregarded the poorer members of their civilization.

Once again, reploids were upset, but they learned to cope. This however, could not be said for X as he was personally upset that he had to inform the entire school that he was robotic and was rather incompetent when it came to English. This did not sit well with him.

So after some thought, X decided it was alright to _completely ignore_ the law and continue on with his merry life without telling the school _anything_.

Which didn't sit well with Doctor Cain.

"X the law states that all you _have_ to have a reploid I.D. and your robotic nature should be stated when applying for any school or job. X, you _have_ to tell the school that you're an android," Cain grumbled. X looked over at him from where he was inspecting a plant and shook his head.

"No I don't," he argued.

"Uh, yeah X, yes you do."

"No I don't."

"Yeah you do."

" _No,_ I don't"

" _X_." Even Fredrick joined in as he moaned out the name. He wasn't happy about it either but his employers already knew he was a reploid so he didn't have to worry about it much.

"The law states that a _reploid_ has to do all that. I'm an android so it doesn't apply," X explained as he returned to his work. Fredrick's face made contact with the lab table in front of him rather loudly and Doctor Cain face palmed and groaned.

 _"_ _X._ " This time the drawn out moan came from Doctor Cain.

"I don't want everybody knowing I'm an android!" the android exclaimed.

"You don't have to tell anybody, you just have to add it to your school I.D. and form!" Doctor Cain argued. X sighed.

"But-," he started.

"X! It's a _law_!"

"I know, it's just. . ."

"X, it's probably best you leave the school anyways," Cain stated. X turned to the scientist, shocked.

"What?"

"Don't get me wrong. It's great that you're getting all that social interaction, but with all these laws coming on and more and more reploids being built . . . It's going to be harder for you to hide your robotic nature. People are going to want to see more of you X. Not as Xavier, but as _X_. Armor and all. You're technically the father of an _entire race_. You can't blow off the media anymore. Now that it has been deemed safe for all reploids to be a part of society, you can't really hide any more. The government is keeping an eye on the Emerald Spears so there's really no excuse anymore."

X sighed. "I know." He paused. "Today's the last day then," he commented remorsefully. Cain nodded.

"It's all for the best," Cain responded. X glanced up at the time. He had been up all night. Only having to charge once every three days was a huge benefit for him over humans. It was just about seven, a bit early for Cain to be up but the scientist _did_ go to bed early complaining of a headache after dealing with the council. The council was a government group that specialized in dealing with anything that had to do with robotics. Which meant that Cain was called before them rather often. Coming home after a few hours of speaking with the group sometimes gave Cain a headache. X supposed that they gave Cain a hard time for something.

With a sigh, X grabbed his backpack and hefted it over his shoulder. He'd make the best of today and see what will happen tomorrow.

Of course, given that X had to inform all of his teachers that it was his last day, he was late to nearly every class. Mr. Hatchbury was the only teacher so far that he had explained what was really going on. The man was not surprised that X was a robot. He _was_ surprised that the rather quiet Xavier in his class was the rather well known _X._

His friends were a bit upset at him for leaving but they understood. Times were changing. Especially for reploids . Technology was skyrocketing. Nowadays you couldn't walk down the side walk without seeing some sort of mechanaloid or reploid. Reploids were becoming one with society and that meant that some things just had to change.

Telling the first five teachers had been easy. It was that he was worried about. He wasn't really sure why but he supposed that it was because it was the teacher that he was the closest to. It was the end of the day though, so he'd have plenty of time to explain things to her and hopefully prevent her from being _too_ upset with him.

X waited until the rest of the class had left and the door had closed before he stood up and walked up to his English teacher.

"Um ? Can I talk to you for a moment?" X asked, nervously holding his backpack. Mrs. Hatchbury turned around to face him from where she was facing the wall.

"Of course Xavier. What can I do for you?"

"Um, well. There was this new law that was passed and um.. . well, I kind of had to add something to my I.D. and I figured you should know," X stuttered out. He then took a deep breath. "I'm a . . ."

"Does this have something to do with that Reploid Identification law?" She asked. X gulped and slowly nodded. Mrs. Hatchbury smiled warmly. "I've known for a while, _X_."

X's eyes widened and he sputtered out a few words. Mrs. Hatchbury reached across her desk to put a comforting hand on his shoulder.

"You weren't really hiding it. First there was the fact that your last name was Light. The same as your creator. Then there was the fact that your guardian is Doctor Cain. Lastly, the fact that you're the king of science and math, but you don't do so hot in English. It didn't take much to put it all together. I had my suspicions around for the first few weeks but you sealed the deal when mentioned to Sam that you didn't really sleep much at night. That and then you stated that you've never had an English class like this before. You've never had one _at all_."

X smiled sheepishly; he vaguely recalled each of those events. They occurred a couple weeks before his friends had discovered. Sam had decided to find out more about him and had quizzed him on his life in English.

He attempted to remain calm while standing in front of the English teacher but there was still nervousness and fear in his eyes. He'd heard a few stories of reploids getting rejected by friends and coworkers when they broke the news of their robot nature to them.

"X, I'm not mad at you at all. It's completely understandable. If _I_ was reploid, I wouldn't say anything about it either. You'd get even more attention if others knew you were _the X_."

X relaxed . "Thanks Mrs. Hatchbury."

"Any time. Now about that last essay."

X's grin immediately dropped and his face grew pale. Mrs. Hatchbury resisted the urge to chuckle. She pulled out X's essay, but didn't show him the grade as she studied it. X's eyes nervously followed her movements.

"It's not perfect," she stated. X started to freak out. She showed him the grade on the front of the essay. "But it's pretty _damn_ close for you."

X's eyes widened when he saw the grade. B+. He had a _B+_. An enormous grin covered his face. His teacher laughed at X's expression. "Normally I would have said one more letter to go, but I suppose you're leaving aren't you."

X nodded. "Too much press, I guess. Cain thinks it will be easier for me if I just dropped out."

nodded. "It probably is. Good luck out there. And keep up the work on your English. Feel free to drop in here any time. I'll be happy to help you." She smiled. The android smiled back at her.

"Sure thing."

paused and gave X a curious look. "You know, you're not like anything I had ever expected. When I first began realizing that you were X, I almost didn't believe it. You acted _completely_ human. Not like a robot at all. And your English. I would have thought that a _robot_ would have some better understanding of writing, but it's almost like you were never given that sort of information."

X sighed. "There were many things I was programmed knowing, such as the ability to speak many different languages. Others, were taught to be in the pod. English was never brought up in either. What I did know before coming here was what I picked up over time and through books. Perhaps reading more will boost my English up. Light knows I read enough. It's just that I never stopped to think about _how_ the author wrote the book and not just the information I was getting from it before coming to your class."

X's teacher grinned at him. "It's good to see that at least _one_ of my students has learned something in my class."

" ," X started. "You're actually a really good teacher. Why would you think that-?"

"Sarcasm Xavier."

"Oh, . . . oh yeah. For a moment there I forgot that that existed. Wow. And you would think that all the time I spend with Lucas would keep me aware of sarcasm more." He rubbed the back of his head in embarrassment.

"Lucas?"

"A scientist back in Cain labs. He's incredibly sarcastic."

nodded. "You tend to be incredibly sarcastic too sometimes."

X rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. "I think I pick that up from him," he stated with a grin. His teacher chuckled.

"Keep in touch will you?" she asked. "I like to know what my former students are doing with their lives. That way I know if I did a good job."

X nodded and was about to respond when his phone went off. He pulled it out of his pocket and glanced at the caller.

"Doctor Cain?" he muttered. "But what on earth-?"

" _X!_ " Cain's voice screamed from the phone as X accepted the call.

"Doctor Cain?"

" _X! We have a problem! A mechanaloid just went crazy earlier today and injured somebody! The police managed to take it down before it hurt anybody else, but when a specialist looked at the robot's programming to see what had caused it, they found_ nothing _wrong with it!"_

"That weird. Is the person alright?" X asked.

" _He was immediately taken to the hospital. His leg is broken but he'll be fine. X, this hasn't been the only instance today."_

"What?! Another mechanaloid when crazy?"

" _Not a mechanaloid, X . . . it was a reploid."_

X looked beyond in shook as stared at him in concern.

"A reploid?" X asked, shakily. If a reploid went crazy, then things were going to be tighter and more difficult for them. Mankind would be less willing to accept them. This wasn't good. What was going on?

" _Yes. But I already did research on the phenomenon. It turns out that the mechanaloid was sent to investigate an old building. The reploid was its repair man for when it came back._ "

"So they had contact with each other? Did-," X paused and swallowed as he gathered enough courage to ask the question. "Do you think that the reploid was the one to blame?"

 _"_ _I don't think so. I've already checked. The reploid never showed any signs of aggression towards humans. And the reploid didn't attack any one until a few hours after the mechanaloid did."_

"Was anyone hurt?"

 _"_ _People were mildly injured but nothing serious._ "

"Cain, what's going on?"

" _I . . . I don't know, X. I don't understand what's going on!_ Nothing _is wrong with the programming!"_ Cain let out a frustrated sigh.

"Doctor Cain?" X asked.

" _I'm just frustrated X. . . the public has already gone around calling the actions of the mechanaloid and reploid 'maverick'."_

X winced. There was already a name out in public for this.

"Doctor Cain, do you think that this will affect reploid productions? I mean, you don't know what's wrong."

 _"_ _I don't know X. I guess we'll just have to wait and see if we can figure out what's going on. However, there is one thing that's bothering me; both accounts of the maverick incidents have mentioned the maverick's eyes flashing red before it attacked and remaining that way as they did so._ "

"Red eyes?" X muttered. He shuttered as a sinking feeling formed in his stomach. Somehow he got the feeling that this wasn't going to be over any time soon.

"Doctor Cain. I'll be right over," X said. He hung up the phone and turned to . " . . . somethings come up. I'm sorry, but I _need_ to go see Doctor Cain right now."

His teacher nodded. "Go ahead, but don't forget to visit!"

X nodded and his teacher watched in amazement as the reploid vanished in a flash to blue light and a whistle. frowned as she contemplated what she had heard from X's side of the conversation.

"A reploid and mechanaloid went crazy?" She shuddered. "It's like robot rabies. Just thinking about it gives me the creeps."

* * *

He woke up with the urge to kill nearly suffocating him. It thundered through his systems as he giddily glanced at the date on the pod's screen to see how long he had been in stasis. Nearly a century. Oh joy! That meant that perhaps his target was awake too!

He chuckled to himself as he leapt from his pod, blonde hair streaming behind and cascading around his shoulders as he stopped. He twirled a piece in his hand.

Oh the next few months were going to be _delightful_. He couldn't wait to dismantle that forsaken Light bot. Megaman had been _fun_ to torment. The short little robot put up such a big fight. It was a pity that his master shut him down before he could finish little Rocky off.

And now Doctor Light had built _another one_. A new one too! One that was all to himself! All alone in the big mean world.

Oh, what was his target's name again? He knew Doctor Light had named him _something_ stupid. Ah, yes, that's right. X. Just one single letter.

But wasn't the android named that way because of his ability to evolve? He chuckled merrily. Oh yes, it would be a _glorious_ fight indeed. He couldn't wait to have that worthless little robot in his hands as he squeezed the life out of him. Maybe the coolant and oil leaking from the android's systems would cover up that nasty color Doctor Light seemed to be so fond of. Blue. Ughh. He shuddered.

He grinned evilly as his systems easily produced hundreds of ways to kill the light bot. Oh yes, X was going to die. And he would make sure that it was by _his_ hands.

But that produced a problem for him. X could only die once. He couldn't feel the joy of killing the robot multiple times. And that just wasn't as fun.

He _knew_ that robots of this era were pathetic compared to X. X was the only true foe he could have any joy fighting against. And he really, _really_ loved a good fight. It was a pity he'd have to kill X.

That was one of his purposes in life. The other purpose was . . . oh yes. To take over the world. Now _that_ would be fun. Because it was so _easy_ to do that with the nice little virus inside of him. The virus made him complete and whole. Without it, he wasn't nearly as powerful. But with it, he would control _any_ robot.

Any robot, that is, except X. His master had informed him that Doctor Light had made X immune to his virus. What a pity. But his virus had _evolved_ since then. It had become something far more nasty than what his master had originally intended. That was good, right?

Perhaps his virus _could_ control X if he gave him a strong enough dose. Wouldn't that be fun? _Controlling his target?_ Then he could play with his target all day long and then when he was done, he'd fix him up. But he'd always preferred the strong will Megaman had over all of the other pathetic little robots. Controlling him would get rid of that.

But what was he going to do when he _did_ take over the world? What would he do to sedate his boredom? His programming didn't answer _that_ question.

Maybe if he didn't kill X but kept him alive so that he could fight him over and over again? And then, over time X would get stronger and the fights would be more fun! He chuckled. And _then_ he would kill him. Oh he was so _smart._ Master would be proud wouldn't he?

He laughed. Yes, soon he would go hunting for that little Light bot, but right now, his systems were telling him that there was a mechanaloid nearby. Oh, what a wonderful way to spread his little virus of doom.

So of _course_ he infected the mechanaloid. And then, the mechanaloid would infect all the other robots it came into contact with.

And as the virus spread, he would hunt his target. There was nothing that could stop him now.

* * *

 _February 16th_

 _Three reploids went "maverick" today and injured two people before they were stopped. This is the third instance of this type of behavior and I still have no idea of what is causing it! There is some talk about stopping the assembly of any more reploids, but I don't think it will happen. Maybe we've become too dependent of them..._

 _The council has now decided to set up a group of "Hunters" to destroy any maverick before it can cause injury. The reploid named Sigma has assigned to lead the Hunters. Sigma is one of the most intelligent reploids I've created and contains my latest circuit designs. His systems should be immune to any problems._

Council meetings were _long._ And of course, as usual, they couldn't make up their minds. Doctor Cain took a side glance at the android sitting next to him. Because it was both him and X that started this whole mess, the council saw fit that they should _both_ be there. To be honest, he'd never been more bored in his life.

Surprisingly, X wasn't nearly as bored as he was. The android at least wasn't showing any obvious signs of misery. Sure, he looked bored, but he wasn't about ready to _kill_ himself.

It had been three hours. And they had gotten _nowhere_. In fact, the only thing they've really been over was discussing what exactly was going on and some possible explanations as to why. Doctor Cain had to thoroughly explain to them that, no, it _wasn't_ a part of their programming that was faulty. He'd even had another more skilled programmer than himself take a look at it and the programmer _confirmed_ that Cain was right! So why were they still going over this?! Shouldn't they be solving the problem now?!

Of course, fate just had to remind him of why he had to be patient and delicate with this sort of thing.

"I say we end all reploid productions! That would solve all of our problems immediately!" one council member cried out. A few members murmured in agreement. Doctor Cain frowned.

"So what? You'll end an entire race just because of some unknown factor affecting their personality?" Doctor Cain argued.

"I realize you might be upset, Doctor Cain. This line of work _is_ your life and it _is_ perhaps the only thing substantial that you've ever done." Cain frowned at the blow. Was this man trying to be polite or piss him of? " _However_ , these reploids are a threat to society."

"You can't kill off an entire race just because a few are attacking people! That's genocide!" X exclaimed.

"Your kind isn't even alive to begin with!" the council member pointed out. X's hands clenched in fury. Why did it seem that so many politicians could be such _jerks_?!

"Now hold on, there's no need to insult these people," another council member added. "They bring up a really good point. It _is_ genocide. Just because they don't look like us internally, that doesn't mean that we can just kill them off. Besides, if you weren't aware, reploids have already become deeply involved in society. Reploids have jobs and many of them are doing the ones that we don't want to. They're becoming an important part of society. We're already starting to rely on them. Not to mention that the general population seems to _like_ them."

"But the laws of robotics state that-."

"They don't have the laws of robotics!" the council member interrupted. "You can't hold that against them. Reploids can't be reploids if they're restricted by the laws. Their entire purpose is to emulate human nature. They can't do that if they're forced to grovel at all human's feet. That makes them _less_ than us!"

"Then what do you suggest? The problem grows bigger every day. More and more reploids are going maverick. Police forces are starting to get overwhelmed. Are we supposed to just let this problem escalate until somebody gets killed?"

"No, we aren't," the council member paused as the rest of the members in the room quieted waiting to hear his solution to the problem. "Create a task force-."

"We already have police!" a council member interrupted.

"- _specifically_ designed to deal with rogue reploids. Or in other words, fight fire with fire. We'll take down reploids with bigger reploids, _before_ they cause harm." Doctor Cain frowned in thought, it _might_ work. The other council members stilled as they pondered the idea, then one of them spoke up.

"Say we create this task force. . . who's going to lead it? I mean, just like any other organization, it has to have somebody at the top."

Doctor Cain raised his hand. "I believe I might have an answer to that question," he stated. A council member waved at him to continue. "I've recently created a reploid that might be able to handle leading this task force. The reploid, Sigma, is one of the most intelligent reploids I've created and contains my latest circuit designs. His systems _should_ be immune to any problems."

"So we have a leader, we have a job set, who's going to fund this?" a council member added seeing that the majority of the council seemed to be liking the idea of the task force.

"Taxes. What else?"

"Cain labs can provide an initial donation," Cain added. X nodded. He didn't quite like the idea of killing off mavericks without giving them a chance, but at this point, he wasn't sure if there was anything else they _could_ do. Mavericks couldn't be reasoned with.

A council member looked around and seeing looks of agreement on most other faces, he raised his hands in surrender. "Alright, so what do we call this task force?"

"Peace makers?"

"That sounds like something out of a book."

"Guardians?"

". . . that's not much better."

"I got it! . . . City defenders!"

"Body Guards for Civilization?"

"Just Defenders if you don't like the city!"

"All these names are _horrible._ They're more likely to make a maverick die from laughter than to instill fear. They're basically going to be _assassins_ and _executioners_. Can you really call an _assassin_ a peace maker or body guard?"

"Sort of?"

"It doesn't really work though."

"Do you have any other ideas?" The council member in question was silent for a while.

"What about maverick hunters?"

The council was quiet.

"I like it, but maverick is the term that the public and newspaper uses. It's not as formal."

"Irregular hunters then?"

"Any objections?" Seeing none, the council member nodded. "Alright, starting now, there is a government organization called the Irregular Hunters with will execute any mavericks before they become too much of a problem. Any questions? No? Meeting adjourned."

X was certain that he was never going to become a politician.


	8. Zero

_"_ _Get your facts first, then you can distort them as you please."-Mark Twain_

 _May 16th_

 _It's been two months since Sigma took control of the Maverick Hunters and he and his hunters have been able to prevent any further injury to the population. Everyone is starting to breathe a little bit easier..._

 _I am a little worried about X. He seems unsure of his place in life and what Dr. Light had planned for him. But given time, I'm sure he'll find his way..._

"What's our current situation?" Sigma demanded. He was furious. Some maverick reploid had demolished not one but _two entire squadrons_. How, he didn't know. But it was his job to make sure that people were safe, and so far it didn't seem like he was doing a very good job of it. The robots hiding behind the large rocks in front of the worn down building turned around in alarm.

"Commander!" one of them shouted.

"Where's that red maverick that wiped out Garma's units!?" Sigma continued.

"In, inside. He's inside that door," one of the robots stuttered out in fear. Sigma frowned and continued walking forward towards the mentioned door.

"You may leave now," Sigma ordered. "I'll take care of this personally."

"By yourself Commander?" the hiding robot asked.

"I don't want any more of my people being sacrificed," he growled out. He stepped through the doorway to see the maverick reploid finish tearing apart another with its bare hands.

Sigma frowned at the brutality and studied the maverick. Its design was like no other he had ever seen.

The maverick turned to him and Sigma got a good look at its face. At first, he had mistaken the maverick for a girl when he saw the long blonde hair, but the face was clearly masculine. A glowing pair of red eyes stared at him from beneath a red and white helmet. The helmet had red protrusion like horns on the sides. A blue gem was at the helmet's center.

The rest of the maverick's armor was mainly red and white with black under armor and golden highlights.

The maverick grinned demonically in a rather terrifying way and Sigma resisted the urge to shudder and prepared himself for the coming battle. The grin was one of a predator, a pure bred killer, a murderer. It was obvious to Sigma that it was built for that purpose, but by who was unknown. It had to be a formidable foe if it had taken down _that_ many hunters.

Sigma frowned as the maverick rushed him immediately with a roar. This was a matter of life or death. One of them wasn't going to live on to see the next morning and judging from the carnage on the floor, he knew there wasn't a very high chance of him making it.

He dodged the attack effortlessly and the maverick gave him a confused look. _This robot is different than the others,_ the maverick realized. With a growl, he let out a series of punches which Sigma dodged. With a roar of his own, Sigma kicked the maverick away, who blocked it with his arm, but was sent flying by the force.

The maverick grinned evilly as he picked himself back up. Perhaps this _was_ going to be an interesting fight.

The two charged each other again and each dealt out blows. Sigma growled to himself as he tried to figure out how to take down his opponent. It wasn't that he wasn't landing any blows on it; it was just that the blows he _did_ land didn't seem to faze the maverick _at all_. Somewhere along the way, the maverick had ripped out a pipe as Sigma took out his own saber, and somehow, the piece of metal didn't melt whenever it came into contact with Sigma's energy saber. In fact, Sigma was rather concerned that it _didn't_ melt. The maverick _had_ to be producing some sort of energy field that protected the metal. Was that what was keeping the maverick from getting damaged too?

Sigma _knew_ this maverick was different than all the other ones he had faced. And he _knew_ the maverick was only toying with him. There was a darker power in that maverick's hands that for some reason he wasn't using. There was something that was just oozing of the maverick in sickening waves, but he didn't know what it was.

He tried to get the upper hand over the maverick by knocking a nearby crate over on top of the thing, but _that_ backfired. The maverick reacted far faster than had expected once more confirming his theory that the thing was holding back, and _kicked it right back at him_. Sigma dodged the crate, but failed to dodge the maverick's next attack as it swept the maverick hunter off his feet with a loud clang. The maverick proceeded drive the pipe through Sigma's arm and part of the cement below, effectively rendering it useless. It then stepped on Sigma's hand to get him to let go of his saber. All of this was done within milliseconds, leaving Sigma no time to react.

Sigma cried out as the maverick's heavy metal boot crushed his hand and he let go of his saber. He growled at the maverick staring down at him and produced the nastiest glare he could muster. Currently he was trapped, but if he could only distract the maverick long enough to use his legs to shove the maverick away . . .

The maverick knelt and grinned down at him nastily. "I'm impressed," it laughed at him. "You've lasted far longer than any other hunk of junk I've gone up against. Then again, I _am_ holding back, but nonetheless." The maverick leaned in closer. "I think I'll keep you. A few upgrades and you'll be a worthy servant."

Sigma roared as he tried to kick the maverick, who laughed and dodged effortlessly, leaping off of the maverick hunter and bounding away.

"Not today!" Sigma growled out as he yanked his trapped arm off the pipe and picked up the saber, quickly getting back to his feet, but not once letting his eyes stray from the maverick. "Or any day for that matter!"

"Oh, did I say you had a choice? My bad," the maverick sneered. Sigma roared and charged the maverick, swinging the sword at him with his good arm. The maverick laughed as he dodged and danced behind the maverick hunter.

"Is that all you've got?" it taunted. Sigma growled and turned around.

"What the hell are you?!" he demanded. The maverick laughed.

"I'm a _god_ ," it announced. Sigma growled and once again lunged at the maverick who continued to laugh at his attempt.

" _God_?! The god I know would never murder innocent lives such as you have!" Sigma roared out. The maverick laughed.

"Oh, you mean that pathetic little fake god humans worship? Oh please, I'm a _real_ god. Not a fairy tale. I'M THE GOD OF DESTRUCTION! And this entire world will bow down before me!"

Sigma roared and charged at the maverick who dodged and grabbed Sigma's neck, holding him up against a nearby wall.

"You're no god," Sigma growled out. "You're a demon."

"Eh. God. Demon. Same thing," the maverick shrugged. "Either way, I _will_ rule this world."

Sigma growled at tried to slash at the maverick who quickly let go of him and leapt away before the blade could touch him. Sigma grinned internally as his auto repair informed him that it had restored functions in his damaged arm. That was a surprise he could use to gain the upper hand.

With a roar Sigma ran forward, bringing his saber down on the maverick who leapt to the side, the side with Sigma's damaged arm. The maverick hunter grinned as this was _exactly_ what he wanted the maverick to do and in a burst of speed he leapt forward to grab the maverick with his injured hand, holding it in place as he quickly brought the saber down on it.

He believed victory was his. That was until his entire shoulder burst into pain as his previously injured arm was tore off. The maverick danced away from Sigma's saber with ease now that it was free. Sigma dropped the saber and glared at the maverick who merely smirked in his direction, holding his shoulder with his good arm. He hadn't seen the maverick's arm move, yet that was clearly _his_ _arm_ in the maverick's right hand.

"Did you _really_ think that that was going to work? I was well aware that you probably had a repair function that restored your arm. In fact, I was beginning to wonder what was taking so _long_."

Sigma growled at him and lunged, but it really was a hopeless fight to begin with. He was outmatched and out gunned. There was no chance that he was going to make it.

This was further proven in the next few minutes as the maverick brutally beat Sigma down. It grinned as it knocked Sigma to the ground and stepped on his head, the grin widening as Sigma screamed in pain, his metal skull starting to bend and break under the pressure.

Then after what felt an eternity for Sigma, the maverick gasped and let out a cry of pain of his own, stepping away from the downed maverick hunter and grasping his head in pain. The gem on his forehead had an odd looking 'W' in it and it appeared to the source of the maverick's pain and Sigma's hope. Now filled with hope at the chance to take the maverick down as he mysteriously screamed in pain, Sigma got to his feet and gathered up all that was left of his energy, delivering a hard punch to the maverick's forehead.

The blue gem cracked and the maverick's eyes went dim as it fell to the ground with a clang, inactive. Sigma panted as he stood staring down at his near killer as his feet shook and his entire body was on the verge of shut down. Without another word, he left the maverick where it lay and made his way outside to where the other maverick hunters were waiting, holding his shoulder as it sparked.

"Sir!" they shouted as he exited the building.

"Get that maverick shipped off to Doctor Cain's! I want that thing studied!" he ordered. The hunters shouted out a chorus of affirmative's.

"Sir, are you okay?" one of them asked.

"I'll be fine," he growled out. "Now get to work!"

"Yes sir!"

* * *

Doctor Cain had never seen anything like it before. Scratch that. He had. But this was different. This programming . . . there was just something wild to it. It wasn't wrong. No, in fact, it was leagues above anything this current civilization had to offer. It was just . . . unnatural.

From what he could decipher from the programming itself, the robot in question was designed to be an android, much like X. But there was a sense of feral intentions hidden deep within the lines. This robot wasn't designed to be a human interface unit like X was. It was designed for war.

It was programmed to handle any weapon imaginable with ease and destruction. It could respond to things several whole _seconds_ faster than the most combat ready reploid of this time.

Cain fully believed Sigma when he said that it had taken down entire units of maverick hunters. He didn't understand much of the programming, but it was definitely designed for combat.

If they could manage to fix the android and get it to fight on their side then Doctor Cain fully believed that all maverick problems would disappear _overnight_. This thing, this maverick, that was currently laid out on the table before him was arguably the most destructive piece of technology Doctor Cain had ever seen, and he'd been inside a nuclear missile base.

And yet, he didn't know how to fix it. The robot's forehead gem had been smashed, a couple of the shards had dug deep into its skull and scratched the surface of its I.C. chip, the heart of its programming.

The programming had been damaged, but by just how much had been uncertain. He'd repaired a few lines that he knew for sure how to fix, but he was an archaeologist for a _reason_. Programming wasn't his specialty. Neither was robotic design, but that career was doing rather well for him at the moment.

Doctor Cain sighed and looked up at X as the android placed a cup of coffee in front of the roboticist turned archeologist.

"Thank you," Cain muttered. X gave him a brief smile and looked at the robot on the table. He winced.

"They didn't clean him up before giving him to you?" X asked, taking a glance at the coolant and reploid blood that covered it's hands and armor. Cain shook his head wearily.

"Sigma seemed to think that it was important that I got to working on it right away. Besides, it gives me a sense of the dire situation that might occur if I'm not careful."

X frowned at the robot and hummed in agreement. A robot like that going crazy _here?_ The idea itself was incredibly horrifying. While the android was strapped down for safety reasons, they really weren't sure of the robot's capabilities. In all reality, the metal bars they were using to hold the maverick's body down might not be able to withstand against its strength.

"Are you any closer to figuring him out?"

"No, he's just like you X. Another android. But he wasn't programmed by Doctor Light. No, . . . there's no way. This programming is just too wild. I . . . well to be honest, I don't know who built him. I can't even tell you how old he is. He might have been sealed away and protected from outside sources like you were."

"Did Sigma say anything about where he was found?"

"An abandoned warehouse? To be honest, Sigma didn't give me much information to work with. He was pretty beat up and I don't think he was feeling very well. He nearly died and I think it took a toll on him. He was a bit snappy when he got back."

"Beat up? I haven't seen him since he left. How bad _was_ he?"

"His armor was just about toast, his arm was ripped clean off. There was some major damage to his head, but lucky for him it didn't damage his I.C. chip. To be honest, after looking at this programming for five hours, I'm surprised he's still alive. This thing's a war machine, X. If Sigma hadn't have stopped it then in that warehouse . . . I don't think even a nuke would have ended its reign of terror. This thing has resiliency."

X was silent for a while after that, gazing at the still android before him, lost in thought.

Cain frowned. "Sigma _did_ say though that the only reason he _did_ win was because the maverick's gem started glowing and it screamed in pain. He said something about a 'w' but I couldn't get much more out of him from it. He seemed a bit off."

"A 'w'? For some reason that rings a whole bunch of alarm bells with me, but I can't put my finger on it. Do you think that perhaps he was from Doctor Light's time?"

"It's highly possible. I mean, Doctor Light wasn't the only roboticist that worked with robot masters. There were quite a few others. I just thought that he was a bit more advanced in his work."

"Wasn't Light competing with another roboticist?"

"The one that tried to take over the world?"

"Yeah?"

"You think this is his work?" Cain asked. X glanced at the programming.

"Maybe?" he paused. "I mean, you said the programming seemed wild, right? I don't think Wily was very sane at all by the time he passed away."

"Didn't he pass away before Doctor Light though?"

"No, he _disappeared_. And he reappeared a few years later with a . . . war bot. . . Cain . . . do you think this is it? I mean, the 'w'. Wily was known for putting 'w's all over his work. "

Doctor Cain frowned and studied the maverick in front of him. "I . . . I don't know, X."

"I . . . don't understand. I thought all of the robot masters were destroyed."

" _This_ isn't a robot master, X. I mentioned that before, didn't I?"

"How do you know?"

"I don't. Not really. I'm not a roboticist, remember? It just . . . it looks a lot like yours, X. But there's something feral added to the mix," Cain said. He studied the programing as X looked over his shoulder.

"This looks like he's still operable," X commented. Cain nodded.

"He is, but there's just so much that I don't understand with this coding that I'm not sure if he's going to go maverick or not."

"How do you know what's damaged?"

"There's a few lines that are obvious; those ones I've already fixed. From there it's all about looking at what makes sense and what doesn't and try to pinpoint possible areas with the impact scratches on the I.C. chip. But to be honest, _none_ of some of the possible areas make sense. Even the areas I did fix don't really make much sense. Like, I get what their supposed to be, but I don't understand _why_ the coding was placed _there_ and not someplace else. He's like you X, he just doesn't make sense."

"Well, save what you do have and take a break. Sitting here all stumped and upset isn't going to fix anything."

Cain sighed and obeyed, clicking the button in the upper left hand corner that would save the programming to the android's I.C. chip. An error box popped up on the screen, the flashing red box drawing the archeologist's complete attention.

"What in the world?" Cain started. "I thought I was able to edit!? He's more like you, X, than I thought." The next few seconds was a flurry of clicks as Doctor Cain struggled to get the changes to save to the android, but the program refused to change. After a while Cain sighed and backed away from the screen.

"Perhaps you're right, X. Maybe I do need to take a break. I can't seem to figure this thing out any more than I could figure out you, but at least from your systems I could derive some form of human like A.I. system. This? I'm not even sure if this is designed to be human!" Cain exclaimed. X frowned as he glanced over the programming.

"Why not?" he asked. Cain looked up at him.

"What do you mean?"

"The programming. The _way_ it's programmed, yes, I'll admit, it _does seem_ a bit feral, but I don't think it really is. From what I can tell, this android's just going to have an extreme thirst for battle and an impulsive nature. Well, I think it will _seem_ impulsive, but that line there mentions something about assessing the situation, so I think it's just designed for quick reactions in battle. _Why_ this android's creator would add so many _battle protocols_ in its _primary programing_ is beyond me. Honestly, I think that's a bit overkill, but battle would be entirely instinctual. I think. Then again, I'm not sure."

". . . Where are you seeing all this?"

"Well some of it I fully understand, like those four lines there, but the rest of it is more of a . . . gut instinct? I don't know. . .I'm just getting a sort of vibe? It that what you would call it?"

"He's not even awake and you're already getting vibes off from him," Cain muttered. X gave the man a lopsided grin.

"To be honest though, Doctor Cain, I really don't think you should try and repair the lines that were damaged. I mean, some of them are okay, but the others just give me a really bad feeling. Like that right there. I'm pretty sure that that is intended to be an order for eliminate target, but I don't think this is just about eliminating enemies, I think that it more of an assassin sort of approach. Like he was specifically designed to kill someone."

"Who?"

"Who else from Wily's time," X stated as if that solved everything. Cain frowned.

"Doctor Light has been dead for _years_."

"Yeah, but his last invention is still around."

". . .you . . . you think that this _thing_ was programmed to _kill you_?!" Cain exclaimed. X nodded.

"The pod. . . the pod mentioned that something like this might happen and that I would probably have to prepare for it, but I didn't think that it would be much of a problem so soon, I thought that I would have a bit more time than that. But I suppose if your name is being broadcasted all over the world as being the father of all reploids things were bound to happen. . . . Doctor Light and Wily were enemies and Wily was extremely hateful of everything Light did. It really wouldn't be all that surprising."

"I . . . I suppose not. . . you know, you know a lot for someone who didn't even know how to cook mac and cheese when he came out of the pod."

X's face turned an alarming shade of red. "The pod skipped over a few things!"

"Seriously X, you don't use a cook book for Kraft mac and cheese," Cain continued, an amused smiled on his face as he watched the android groan.

"I know that now!" X exclaimed. He huffed and turned away from the archeologist who was laughing at his discomfort. "The pod never told me that some recipes were just on the box. . ."

Cain laughed out loud at the android.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," X stated. Cain continued to laugh. "But seriously, you should take a break."

Doctor Cain nodded and stood, grabbing his cane and allowing X to guide him out the door, the android happily talking about whatever random thing that had happened that day, seemingly unphased by the fact that Doctor Cain was trying to reactivate someone who was programmed to _kill him_.

* * *

A few hours later, Doctor Cain rubbed his hands together nervously as he watched the team begin the first steps to activate the previously maverick android through a computer screen. Doctor Cain had been unable to change _anything_ in the android's program, much like he couldn't for X. Determined to have an unstoppable robotic weapon on their side, the council ordered the android awoken. If it was still maverick, they would try to reason with it and if it couldn't be reasoned with they would detonate the entire room, permanently ending the maverick's tyranny. If it wasn't maverick anymore for whatever reason, then they would treat it like any other new built, introduce it to the world and convince it to join the maverick hunters. (That seemed to be the goal of this entire operation.)

For his own safety, Doctor Cain was not allowed to be inside the room during the operation. X wasn't either, as they feared that the two meeting would trigger a maverick response in the red android. However, X wasn't even around to watch the event through the screens as he was currently busy telling another maverick hunter recruiter that _no_ , he did _not_ want to join the maverick hunters. He was perfectly fine _not_ destroying his own kind, maverick or not, thank you very much.

Cain sucked in a deep breath in anticipation as a council member informed the team to wake him up. With a nod, the leader of the group in the room, hit the activation buttons on the computer and the red android's systems slowly came online.

* * *

He awoke slowly, his systems informing him that there had been damage to his I.C. chip and some coding and memory had been lost. Which was funny, because he couldn't remember a _damn_ thing so _some_ was really _all_. Unless that weird dream he had prior to him waking up was considered a memory. He'd be having nightmares of crazy old guys for years to come if that was true.

He opened his eyes, not missing the way a human like robot sighed in relief when it looked into his eyes. He groaned and moved to sit up, but was prevented from doing so. A glance downward told him that he was being held down by metal bars.

"Why am I tied down?" he asked. A human like robot rushed to his side to undo the restraints.

"A safety precaution," the robot answered. "We were unsure of your programming."

Now free, he sat up and looked around at the group of human like robots as they stared at him with curiosity. Instinctively, a gloved hand reached up to his cheek, brushing against it briefly.

"Is there something on my face?" he asked, hoping to snap the group out of the odd trance they were in. They looked stupid. One of the human like robots shook his head, snapping out of his daze.

"N-no. Um, do you know your name?" the robot asked, figuring it would be best to start with basic protocols in this sort of situation. In all honesty, based on the stories he had heard, he had fully expected to die today.

He raised his eyebrow. Why? Did they not wake him? He knew from the instant he woke up that they weren't his creators, but even if they just woke him up, shouldn't _they_ know his name?

What even _was_ his name? _Zero,_ his mind informed him. Yes, he was well aware of the number zero. _Zero_ , it repeated. What? Zero _what_? Zero dogs? There were no dogs in the room thank you very much, he could tell that for himself. He had _eyes_.

 _Zero._

He frowned. His mind just wouldn't shut up about that number. Was that his name or something? Was that what was going on? Why was he named after a _number_?

Having no other clue as to what his name was, he went with it. The crazy old man in his dreams had called him Zero anyways, so he figured that probably was his name, but why _Zero_? That wasn't even a normal name!

"Zero," he answered the human like robot. In all honesty, the name _felt_ right, but he couldn't help by wonder why _Zero_ of all things. Why not Infinity or Orion or Bob? Wait, no, not Bob. Bob was a horrible name for him. He couldn't be _Bob_.

He glanced around the room, his mind instinctively identifying emergency exits and his eyes falling on four hidden cameras for no more than a second each. He was being watched. Were they really that concerned about his programming?

One of the human like robots brought over a mirror for him to look into while another rattled on about how society worked. Society? Who needed civilization? . . . _Apparently_ these people.

Zero took one glance into the mirror and frowned. _Hair_. Lots and lots of hair. Seriously, where did it all come from? He pulled it around his head and inspected a few strands. They were all _individual_ strands, none of them split of into two strands or anything. But _how?_ The hair tie at the back of his head was probably only the size of a quarter. How it spread out to become a thick mass of hair spanning the size of _multiple_ basket balls was beyond him.

He glanced at the human like robot that had been speaking.

"Why do I have so much hair?" Zero asked. The robot opened its mouth a couple of times, clearly not expecting _that_ sort of question or to be interrupted.

"I don't know sir," the robot answered after a while. Zero glanced at himself in the mirror.

"Who _designed my armor_? Most of it looks badass, but there's some parts where it's just _what the hell_?!" Zero continued. The human like robot shrugged and stopped speaking, seeing that the red android was clearly more interested in its own appearance than listening to him.

Zero inspected himself for a few more seconds and then turned to the human like robot next to him. "Soooo, what type of robot are you?" he asked. The robot sighed. He'd covered that earlier, but it seemed that his theory that the android hadn't listened to him was correct.

"Reploid. Short for replicated android. Our designs were all based off of X's, an android, and were originally created by the great Doctor Cain-." The robot was cut off by Zero.

"Yep, politics."

"That's not even-."

"Do you see this face? I _don't care_. It sounds boring so it's gotta be politics," Zero deadpanned. The now identified reploid blinked at him. Zero looked around the room, and turned to the reploid when he saw nothing interesting.

"Soooooo, am I allowed out of here, orrrr?" he asked. The reploid blinked and then glanced up at one of the cameras Zero had seen earlier. Zero noticed this and waved at the hidden camera with a smile. The intercom clicked as a voice blared over the static.

" _He can leave, just have somebody follow him. He_ is _a new built after all_."

Zero frowned. New built. He didn't like the term. He was fairly certain he had more fighting experience than everyone in the entire room. How he knew that, he didn't know.

"So how tight of a leash do I have to have on?" Zero asked. The reploid that had been explaining things to him finally got tired of dealing with him and snapped.

"Just shut up, be polite, and you'll be off the leash before you know it."

"But I already _know_ that I'm going to be on a leash so that-," Zero started, but was cut off. Apparently it was _his_ turn.

"What did I say about shutting up!? God, I _hate_ new builts," the reploid stated.

"I hate old builts?" Zero stated, the insult ending as more of a question because he was sure that the reploid before him was younger than he was for some reason. The reploid glared at him. Zero decided to call him "Boss 'roid" in his systems.

"Just shut up."

Zero shrugged and followed the reploid out of the room. "Somebody woke up on the wrong side of the bed," he commented.

" _Shut up_ ," Boss 'roid snapped. Zero made a face as one of the reploids from behind walked up beside him.

"Uh, you do know what politics are right?" he asked. Zero gave the reploid a glance.

"Yeah, I'm just messin'. He gave off a bad vibe so I decided to be an ass. Politics was the first boring subject that came to mind," he stated. The reploid shook his head.

"Oh boy, you're going to be a riot."

Zero grinned at him. "You wanna join?"

" _No_ thank you."

The red reploid continued to grin and turned to face the snappy reploid that was leading down a ridiculously long hallway. "Oi boss! How much longer till we get there?"

Zero was ignored.

"Hey! . . .Hey! . . . Hey Boss! . . . hey Bo-!"

"ARE YOU DEAF?! _SHUT UP!_ "

"No, my hearing's like fifty times better than a human's, but that's not the point. Boss, this is really urgent."

" _What,"_ Boss 'roid moaned out.

"How much longer till we get there? Cause I swear you're so old that if we walk any longer you're going to fall apart on me and I can't let that happen, you feel?"

"I frinkin' hate you."

Zero laughed.

 **Author's Note: Yeah . . . Zero's a bit of an asshole. . . My editor hates him. Personally, I think that this starting personality fits him and leaves room for a lot of growth and development into the maverick hunter we all know and love. For some reason, I imagine him as being a pain in the ass towards everybody and being perfectly happy with it. Of course, this will change but the need to cause trouble will probably stay with him, just not as bad as this. Chapter 9 has some rough spots in it that are really confusing, so as soon as I straighten those out _and_ get my editor to look it over, I will post it.**


	9. Budding Friendships

_"_ _We are all here on earth to help others; what on earth the others are here for I don't know."-W.H. Auden_

DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT OWN MEGAMAN X OR ANY RELATED CHARACTERS. If I have forgotten to mention this in previous or future chapters, please keep in mind that I do not own ANYTHING.

WARNING: THERE IS AN INSTANT OF POOR LANGUAGE IN THIS CHAPTER! It won't happen often and it's not too bad, but changing what I wrote took away from the realism. They're _teenagers_. They are _going_ to drop a few bad words every so often. I promise I won't be making a habit of this, but I figured once or twice every fifty thousand words (just under that amount, but close enough) wasn't bad enough to raise the rating.

* * *

It was official, he determined. Zero was a complete and utter asshole. Of course, X had yet to actually talk to the red reploid in person, but he'd caught snippets of Zero's conversations when he visited the maverick hunters for some business of Doctor Cain's in the hallways. There was no off switch. Zero did not work well with others. The only Commander he respected was Sigma, a trait every maverick hunter shared; all the other ones he flipped off and ignored. X had heard rumors of the amount of times Zero had been placed on house arrest. The number reached well beyond a hundred and Zero had only been activated for a couple of weeks. He probably owed time for the next few years.

The only good side about him appeared to be the fact that he could tear through an entire army of mavericks by himself and not break a sweat. He was a tank, the maverick hunters' triumph card. But it was also a problem, because once again, Zero could not work well with others. He grew impatient fast. He'd try to slow down and wait for anyone that was assigned to him, but most of the time, his impatience got the better of him.

Zero loved to taunt. It didn't matter who. If he didn't like you, he would taunt you until you were steaming from the ears in anger. Of course, nobody really knew how Zero would react to somebody he did like. Everyone agreed that Sigma's and Zero's relationship was more of a militaristic acceptance or equal. Not a friend. There were rumors that Storm Eagle had become on good terms with the red android, but no one knew for sure or even dared to ask. Zero scared people.

X sighed as he stared at the long list of maverick hunter casualties. The casualties were always high; government funding didn't exactly provide for the best equipment. Only higher class hunters got better gear.

Maverick hunters were divided into different classes. C class was the lowest, followed by B, and then A, the highest. There wasn't anything else above that, though there were talks of one being added. C and B classes represented nearly all of the maverick hunter population. "A" class maverick hunters took up maybe three percent.

It was depressing to see the casualty numbers so high, especially when the maverick hunters were the only ones standing between the mavericks and humans. Maverick attacks were increasing every day, slowly growing exponentially.

"You know, I see you around every so often, but not often enough to really be a maverick hunter. Are you an advisor or something? Didn't think reploids could hold those kind of positions," a voice stated from behind X. X blinked. He didn't quite recognize the voice, but it rang a bell, like he'd heard it before. . .

X turned. Ah yes, speak of the devil and he shall come, _that's_ why the voice sounded familiar.

Zero was standing right behind him, giving him a curious look.

"No, I'm not a maverick hunter, but I work with Doctor Cain. He has me run up here to do errands sometimes," X responded. Zero nodded.

"Figured it was something like that. I didn't exactly peg you for the battle type. Your stance is too relaxed and weak."

X blinked. "And now I see why most of the maverick hunters really don't like you."

"My reputation precedes me," Zero said as he mock bowed. "But seriously, what did I do?"

"You're a quick judge of character. And if I actually did care about fighting prowess and had an ego, that statement might have been considered offensive ."

"Noted. But um, what's wrong with being honest? Telling them the problem would help them fix it."

X gave Zero an odd glance. "You really don't know how to interact with people do you?"

Zero stared at X. "Are you talking about social skills? . . . yeah, I don't have any."

X sighed. "There's nothing wrong with being honest. It's just sometimes the truth hurts and beating around the bush or just _not saying anything at all_ could greatly increase your chances to having a remotely decent relationship with someone. Even if you are being honest, you can't go around insulting people all the time. People don't like that."

The red android narrowed his eyes at X in thought. "And what's the benefit to having decent relationships?"

X looked at Zero in bewilderment. "Other than the fact that it _feels_ nice?!"

Zero blinked. "Yeah, I don't think its within my capacity to have feelings."

X face palmed. "I'm pretty sure it is, you dim witted, girly looking mechanaloid. What, did your creator label you as a failure and give you the dumbest design ever?!"

"OI! Where the hell is this coming from!? Don't insult my appearance! I happen to think its badass!"

"Baring the fact that you look like a pathetic girl? I bet that you can't even lift a dresser and your reputation is only based off of illusion and not off of actual strength! No scratch that! You couldn't even take down a fly!"

Zero narrowed his eyes in anger. If there was anything he was sensitive about, it was his appearance and his fighting skills. He'd just about had enough with people mocking him for his appearance. It wasn't his fault he just so happened to look so feminine. The little blue robot in front of him had just insulted _both_. That made him beyond pissed. Zero leaned over to him and was about to yell when the green eyed reploid in front of him smirked and held up a finger. Zero was about to blow up at him anyways, but X's calm voice cut through his anger and made him pause.

"See? Anger. You _are too_ capable of feeling," X stated with a grin. Zero's anger immediately dissipated as he stared at the little blue android in shock.

"No hard feelings right?" X stated as he patted Zero's shoulder and walked away.

Zero continued to stare on in bewilderment for a while before snapping out of his trance and turning around frantically to try and find the brown haired, green eyed, reploid that had just spoken to him. Unfortunately, he was nowhere in sight.

Grabbing the nearest reploid he could see and scaring the crap out of him, he stared at him desperately.

"Who was that reploid I just talked to?!" Zero demanded. The reploid 'eeped'.

"I-I d-don't know,sir!"

"He has brown hair, green eyes, wears a lot of blue, and works for Doctor Cain!"

"X?" the reploid asked nervously. Zero blinked.

"X? No, I want a name!"

"That _is_ his name! X! He was built by Doctor Light! He's basically the father of all reploids. Our design was based off of his!"

Zero let go of the reploid and blinked as he trembled nervously before him.

"Ahh, errrr, sorry, uhhh, thank you?" Zero stuttered out, before briskly turning and walking away.

The reploid blinked as he left. Did _the red demon_ , _Zero,_ actually just say _thank you_ to him? He screamed. The apocalypse was going to happen. The world was ending. He was going to go scream down this random hallway now.

* * *

"I can't believe you actually work here," commented Tony. "I mean, this is _Cain_ labs!"

"I can," Sam commented. Tony frowned and sent a glare her way, which was countered by a sly looking smirk. The group had agreed to meet up with X at Cain labs, that way X didn't have to deal with the gawking bystanders when he visited them. The crowds had dimmed down when they got used to the idea of reploids walking among them, but the fact that X was the _first_ hadn't quite gotten old to them yet.

"Um, Tony. It's really not all that surprising, and I don't really do much," X stated. "All I do is a few errands every once and a while for Cain and then my own personal projects. That and attempting to avoid all public appearances, but failing and getting wrapped up in the creations of government organizations and being surrounded by jerks that call themselves council members."

"Wow." Sam slow clapped. "You really don't like the council do you?"

"No, never have, never will. Politics are insane. It amazes me how many stupid ideas smart people can come up with sometimes."

"Speaking of government funded organizations, what do you think of the maverick hunters?" Mark asked.

"A good idea, I suppose. But I really would have preferred if the government spent more money towards figuring out _why_ reploids go maverick," X answered.

"Would you join them?" Sam asked. X hesitated.

"Maybe, but I'm really not all that into fighting so I probably wouldn't last very long. I'm too hesitant and unwilling to kill."

"That is true. We all know X is just a big softie," Tony commented. Sam rolled her eyes and sent a crumbled up piece of paper in his direction.

"Hey! What was that for?!"

"Defending X because he's too nice to defend himself," Sam responded.

"He's a big boy! He can defend himself!"

"He's like not even a year old. He's a baby."

X frowned. "I don't know who to be mad at anymore," he commented. "Tony for calling me weak or Sam for calling me a baby."

The group laughed briefly. Sam leaned over to X and gave him a devious sort of look.

"So how often do you go out on your own?" Sam asked. X gave her a confused look.

"Often enough."

"Meet any pretty girls on those outings?" X decided he wasn't going to answer that question.

"WHERE IS THIS COMING FROM?!" Mark exclaimed. He was ignored.

"Sam, you said this before, he's not even a year old. Babies don't go on dates. If they do, they have some seriously messed up parents," Tony commented.

"Hey, I was just _asking_. He was designed to have the mentality of a teenager when he first woke up so you never know, he might actually be attracted to people."

"This is a really awkward conversation. Why are we talking about this?" X asked. He was ignored.

"Guys or girls?" Tony asked. X decided that now was a really good time to deliver that program to Cain. Mark face palmed and groaned into his palms. Nicole looked indifferent about the entire conversation and continued to listen.

"I don't know let's ask him. HEY X!" Sam shouted. She looked around the room and realized that the medium sized form of blue was missing. She stuck her head out the hallway. "X! ARE YOU GAY?!" He was nowhere to be seen.

"Where'd he go?" Sam asked. The others shrugged.

"He's not hiding in the supply cabinet like last time. I checked," Tony commented. Sam shrugged.

"Eh, we'll ask him later."

* * *

X walked into Cain's personal lab, tossing the flash drive in his hand up and down and giving the other visitor in the room a strange look. You didn't usually see a maverick hunter in Cain labs. Particularly _that_ maverick hunter. Shaking his head and deciding it wasn't any of his business, X slapped the flash drive down on the lab table Cain was working on and walked over to a nearby cupboard, grabbing a box of pocky down from the top shelf and sitting down in a rolling chair, sliding across the floor as he did so.

"I figured you were going to give me the program after your friends left," Cain stated, not looking up from his work. X placed a pocky stick in his mouth and replied.

"I was, but then they decided to have a really awkward conversation."

"Oh really? What about?"

X didn't reply, but instead stared at Cain blankly as he continued to eat. Cain spared X a glance from his work.

"That bad huh?"

"You have no idea." X then took notice of the red armored maverick hunter standing awkwardly in the room. "Do you ever go anywhere without your armor?"

The maverick hunter, Zero, looked at him, then down at his armor, and then back up before shaking his head.

"No, is that a problem?"

"It is if you're trying to be social. Pocky?" X asked, holding out the box to Zero. It took a little while before the blonde haired android realized what X was offering and he hesitantly reached out to pull a stick from the box. Zero stared at the food item curiously. "You eat that," X elaborated. Zero frowned and sent a glare X's way.

"I gathered that much," Zero responded as he tentatively placed the stick in his mouth.

"You ever eaten anything before?"

"Eating is not necessary for a robot's survival."

"You maverick hunters lead such depressing lives,'" X commented, shaking his head. "Humans eat for pleasure sometimes. Why can't we?"

". . . It's expensive."

"Everything is expensive. Prices have risen by almost fifteen percent in the last thirty years. Life is expensive. This flashdrive," X rolled over to Cain's table to pick up the flash drive he brought, "was thirty bucks. _Thirty bucks!_ "

"How many gigs?" Zero asked.

"I don't even remember."

Cain snorted. "You remember the economy stats for the last thirty years, a time line you weren't even awake for and you don't remember the details of a purchase you made within the last month," the archaeologist commented.

X stared at Cain blankly for a moment. "Details aren't important."

"Says the guy who ranted about how the store manager didn't tell you where they bought their flower seeds from because it was a minor detail."

"That's different. I'm passionate about my plants," X commented. Cain paused in his work to turn to Zero.

"If you ever incur the wrath of X, which by the way, beware the wrath of a gentle giant, buy him a plant and he'll soften up on you," Cain commented.

"That is not entirely accurate," X argued.

"Fredrick pissed you off when he dyed all of your clothes purple because he was tired of your affiliation with blue and then bought you a cactus and you were fine!"  
"It was a cactus! Who doesn't like cactuses?"

"Sane people."

"Oi!"

"And it's _cacti_ not cactuses. Shouldn't you know that?"

X glared as his face turned red. "It just slipped out . . . . leave me alone."

"I'm joking X," Cain laughed. X stuck a tongue out at him and huffed, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Still your adoration of plants _isn't normal."_

X stuck his tongue out at his caretaker. "Sue me."

Zero stared back and forth between Cain and X, completely lost.

"I have no idea what just happened," the maverick hunter admitted.

"You're not used to using your social processor, probably. This is the first time you're trying to understand what people are saying and it's probably getting overloaded. Give it some time. It'll get easier."

"No offense, Zero, but do you even _have_ a social processor?" Cain asked. Zero shrugged.

"None taken."

"Oh he does," X commented. "It's just really glitchy." Cain stared back at X.

"How do you know these things?"

"I got skills," X stated. Cain rolled his eyes.

"No magic this time?"

"Nah man."

Zero continued to look lost.

"So why _are_ you here?" X asked. Zero paused.

"I came to inform you that your insults are terrible."

X laughed. "I knew that. I'm too nice to come up with good insults. But that just proved my point."

"What?" both Cain and Zero asked.

"Social processor? That just proved that he had one!"

"X, you are too young to be going insane," Cain commented.

"Oh come on! He came all the way from Hunter Headquarters to inform me that I can't insult people!"

"It was actually more to sedate a burning curiosity," Zero commented. X glanced up at him.

"What about?"

"I don't understand you."

"I don't think you understand anybody just yet, no offense."

"That's not what I meant. Other people I understand, but you I just . . . don't," Zero commented. X gave the android a funny look, but said nothing more on the subject.

"I hate to break up this lovely conversation about Zero's social difficulties, but _I_ need to take an important call. Unless X, you want to discuss with the council again," Cain said.

"NOPE! _No_ thank you! I am leaving. Zero, we are leaving. Let's go. Out the door!" X answered as he half shoved half dragged the maverick hunter out of the room and threw the empty pocky box into the trash.

"I think I understood what was happening the first time," Zero commented.

"Ever heard of dramatic effect and humor?" X asked. Zero gave X a blank stare as the door closed behind them and then rubbed his forehead with a groan.

"This social stuff is more complicated than I thought."

"What did you think it was? A walk in the park?"

"What?"

"Sarcasm. Metaphors."

"Your words mean nothing to me. Speak English."

"I _am_."

X merely gave Zero an amused stare as the red android groaned and muttered something about regretting to come. Shaking his head, X reentered the room his friends were currently hanging out in.

"X! Where'd you go?" Tony commented as soon as X stepped into the room.

"Uh, delivered something to Doctor Cain."

"You sure that was it, or were you avoiding us too?"

"Oh, I was _definitely_ avoiding you."

"Yeah, we kind of figured," Sam added. She paused as she caught a glimpse of Zero's figure in the doorway. "Who's your friend?"

"Eh, friend?" X gave a questioning glance towards Zero as if asking permission. The blonde haired robot shrugged in response. "His name's Zero."

"Zero? So who built you?" Tony asked, turning towards the maverick hunter, wondering, only because he did _not_ want to be working for a company that decided to make an obviously male robot look so girly. The robot's appearance wasn't all _that_ bad but it was concerning none the less.

"We have _no idea_ ," Zero stated. Tony raised an eyebrow.

"Really?" he asked. Zero nodded.

"Yep. They found me tearing apart maverick hunters over in Japan. Apparently I was insane."

Tony laughed. "No seriously."

"He _is_ being serious, Tony," X commented. Tony paled.

"Then why-?"

"Got hit in the head and messed up my core programming. Apparently the part that made me crazy was the part that got damaged. For the time being, I'm not going to run around tearing people apart, but considering how well my systems seem to repair themselves, nobody knows how long that's gonna last. Long story short, the government recognized my power and wanted me to tear things apart for them, so here I am."

X blinked as the room grew very silent. "Zero, this is why people find you terrifying."

Zero shrugged after a moment's thought. "I guess I can see your point."

"The government is fucked up," Tony stated after a moment. Zero burst out laughing.

"TONY!" Mark exclaimed in response to Tony's curse.

"MARK! You go to high school. THIS SHOULD NOT BE SUPRISING TO YOU!" Tony retaliated.

"You know what, kid. I actually agree with you," Zero commented.

"Technically, he's older than you," X argued. Zero glared.

"Shut up. I could kick his ass any day of the week."

"That doesn't make him any younger than you."

"God, if I knew you were this annoying, I wouldn't have come."

X grinned innocently. Sam looked between the two of them and decided to restate her question from earlier.

"Seriously though X, are you gay?" she asked. X turned to her in alarm and mortification.

"No," X stated firmly. Zero just looked confused.

"What-?" Zero started. X cut him off with a bewildered look.

"Oh my god, you innocent little cupcake," Sam said. Zero gave her a curious look.

"Innocent? I murder for a living," Zero stated. Sam shook her head.

"You're still really innocent. How do you not know what homosexuality is?!"

". . . you didn't say that," Zero defended. "I wasn't designed for social interaction."

"Obviously not," Tony snorted.

"But seriously what-?" Zero started but what cut off again.

"I VOLUNTEER AS TRIBUTE!"

"Tony, that movie is over a century old," Sam commented. She was ignored.

"I will school cupcake about all the wonders of life," Tony said as he stood and pulled Zero to the corner of the room.

"You're going to scar him for life," X said as Tony did so.

" _You_ 're fine!" Tony reasoned.

"I was _designed_ to handle social issues. Zero, however, was not."

"His name is cupcake now, catch up X, and he will be just fine."

". . . he only just started using his social processor."

"He'll be _fine_ , X."

"Uhm, what's going on?" Zero asked.

"Hush child and listen," Tony commanded.

"Don't break him!" X exclaimed.

"Yes Mom!"

X sent a worried, yet amused glance in Zero and Tony's direction before turning back to face Sam and the others.

"So, what happened while I was gone?" X inquired. Sam shrugged.

"Nothing much. Mark decided that the trashcan was a good place to store Tony while we waited for you-,"

"Um, that was _you_ ," Mark argued. Sam looked unfazed as she continued.

"And then when you still didn't show up, Tony kind of flopped over, still in the trash can mind you, and chased us around, screaming something about trash taking over the government. That's why the trash can is over there in the corner. Tony's just lucky that there was nothing but papers in there, which by the way, we dumped all that on the desk over there."

X blinked a few times before looking at the said items she mentioned; the trashcan was indeed in the corner and the papers that he _knew_ were supposed to be thrown away were indeed on top of the desk. He shrugged. He wanted to put those in the recycling bin anyways.

"Does our BS not faze you anymore?"

"Not really," X commented.

"This is completely off topic and yet sort of is, but what _is_ your opinion on gay marriage?" Sam asked.

"Fine," X stated.

"Elaborate," Sam urged.

"I mean, it's not any different than a reploid and human couple and those are allowed. Either way, they can't have kids. There's nothing wrong with it and there's absolutely no reason why I should be allowed to go against it. It's only fair after all."

At the other's confused looks, he continued. "I mean, how could I argue for reploid and human equality, something that would allow a human and nonhuman to marry, if I couldn't accept a relationship between two _humans_."

The room was silent, even Tony and Zero were quiet and Tony was staring at X with a look of awe.

"The world needs more people like you, X," Sam finally stated.

"X, I freaking love you right now," Tony commented as he bounded over and latched onto X's arm. X gave the teen an annoyed look.

". . .lawyer," Nicole commented. The group shouted out an "aye!" in agreement.

"WAIT NO!" Tony shouted. "Then he'll become tainted by the horrors of life! No, X must remain holed up in his lab of innocence and not be exposed to the reality that is human arrogance and stupidity!"

"Uh, Tony?" Sam started. "X already knows more about human idiocy than you do."

Cain, who had apparently finished his conversation with the council rather quickly, walked in at that moment and looked at the group with a curious gaze.

"What are we all talking about?" Cain asked.

"X's future job!" Tony responded cheerfully as he detached himself from X's arm.

"Which is?"

"Lawyer," Sam responded.

"Oh, 100%. All the way," Cain agreed. X sighed. He had wanted to avoid the political section too. He gave Zero a concerned look; the maverick hunter was only paying attention to half of what was going around him.

"Zero, are you alright?" X asked. Zero snapped out of his stupor in an instant and turned to X.

"Yeah, I was just looking up the public opinion on gay marriage."

"And?"

"Well, especially after what you just said, people are idiotic assholes."

The group blinked.

"He's blunt," Sam commented.

"It's true," Tony responded. "We're assholes to each other. Did you know that the Aztecs treated the Spanish like gods when they first came? They let them take all their gold and food and put on this big celebration for them and guess what the Spanish did?"

"Left with all of their stuff?" Sam guessed.

"Nope! They killed them. Every last one of them. . . . Well they wiped out a city, that I know for sure."

The group winced.

"To be honest, that sounds just about right at this point, especially considering that we decided to just kill all of the mavericks instead of trying to find a cure. Well, we lock some of them up, but the point still stands," Sam commented. "Geez X, why do you value humanity so much when we do crap like that all the time?"

"Because every once in a while humanity does something that makes fighting for it worthwhile."

". . . He's so patriotic and half the world hates beings like him," Tony commented. X sighed. Somehow most conversations usually ended up with either his friends making fun of him or commenting on his apparent "greatness". X just wanted to be left alone.

Cain mentioned something about having to get back to work and left the room. Soon after, Zero received a furious call about "where the hell he went" and "why wasn't he back yet?". The maverick hunter teleported away in a blinding flash of light immediately following.

Which left X alone with his friends. Somehow he wasn't excited as he should have been, especially considering the way the last two conversations had went. Maybe he really was getting tired of their "BS".

Author's Note:

 **ALL OF MY STORIES WILL BE ON HIATUS UNTIL MY LIFE RETURNS TO NORMAL. One of my friends is considering suicide right now and that is placing a serious amount of stress on me especially because she considers me to be one of her only friends. Until this issue resolves, I am taking a break from writing. None of my stories will be dropped; I love them too much. But for the time being, I can't focus long enough to write very well and I don't have the time.**

Yeah, this chapter was a bit later than what I had intended but it was still on time for the most part right? . . . New chapter is planned to come next month and I can't really guarantee any faster. Homework tends to come in spirts where every teacher suddenly decides that all the sudden, _I don't have a life_. On top of that, I'm easily distracted when I'm at home, which is the only place in which I'm comfortable enough to write. That and writer's block haunts me 25 out of 30 days of the month. Somebody please tell it to go away! And while you're at it, would you take care of the mutant plot bunnies too? They're distracting me from finishing my stories.

I'll stop making up excuses now. On another note, I don't bite! Feel free to criticize (within reason). I am well aware that I write _a lot_ of filler. But you should all know the story behind Megaman X right? This fanfic focuses more on what you _don't_ know.

I'm trying to shove the plot along. I really am, but there are a few things I need to take care of before I can get actual beginning of the video game. So far this doesn't really count because I've taken like five minutes of the game and a paragraph of official text and turned it into a 45K word story. (Its 50K on my word document which is why I keep saying so. I know its not really 50K because at least 3,000 of that is notes and little bits of the next few chapters.)

My editor said that this chapter was much better than previous ones in terms of writing quality. Personally, I think it about the same.

PLEASE DON'T BE OFFENDED BY ANYTHING MENTIONED ABOVE IN THE STORY. The jab at the government was unintentional. I didn't even realize what I have done until I was handing it to my editor. And I am well aware that gay relationships is a very sensitive topic, but I _have_ gay friends, so _of course_ I'm going to support that side of society even though I personally am not. There is nothing about that that makes them any less human than anybody else in the world. If anybody feels personally offended by this, you don't _have_ to read this story. The topic won't appear very often, mostly because I am simply not a romantic person.


	10. Drinking Problems

_"_ _Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated." -Confucius_

Cain labs had received a call just before midnight from an elderly man whose mechanaloid had malfunctioned. It didn't _sound_ like a maverick case, but nonetheless X was dispatched with a warning to be careful. Turns out, the mechanaloid truly wasn't maverick; one of its wires had just shorted out and made it malfunction. It took X less than ten minutes to find and fix the problem. He stayed for another hour conversing with the owner, but left soon after that when the old man showed signs of exhaustion.

He was on his way home when he was nearly knocked over by somebody walking suddenly out of a bar. X steadied the man that had stumbled out and kept them both from falling over. The man was bent over so X didn't get a good look at his face.

"My apologiez," the man hiccupped and turned to look up at X, dull green eyes recognizing a familiar emerald after a few moments of thought. "X? Wad you doin here?" the man said, placing emphasis on the "here" as he swayed.

X blinked once, then twice as his optics recognized the human in front of him and relayed the information back to him.

" _Tony_?!" X asked in disbelief.

"Theeeee one and only. I'm gonna be Tony Stark. Tony Stark. Yah hear? You can be my second in command if you want, but I'm gonna be Tony Stark," the now identified Tony slurred. "I'm a gonna be a rich inventor. Rich, rich, rich."

"You are _underage_ ," X stated, completely bewildered that his friend was drunk.

"I'm not underage; I hacked the internet. I can be _anything_."

X was suddenly very concerned with the welfare of his friend. "Let's get you home. Where's your house?"

"SomeWHEEEERRRE over the rainbow! SomeWHEEREEE . . . I don't remember. Cats and dogs and somethin about scarecrows and tin people," Tony said.

"Your _house_ , Tony. Where is it?" X asked.

"My house? It got picked up in that toooornado, don't you remember? It went up, up, up, up, and weeeeeeeeeeeeee!"

X sighed. He wasn't going to get anything out of his friend.

"I really liked that part where the donkey started dancing."

"Uh," X was completely at loss as to what to say.

"And then navy macffy, mikfeee, nany . . . this old lady made it snow and it was _sooooo_ pretty."

"Um, tell me more about this donkey?" X urged, hoping to keep him distracted while he took him to Cain's house. He didn't know where Tony lived and he needed to get off the streets _before_ he got caught and arrested. Cain was out on a trip anyways, so he shouldn't mind too much. Luckily, the house wasn't too far from here.

"The donkey? It was wearing clothes and makeup and it looked _so_ pretty."

X nodded along, not entirely sure what was going on.

"Do you think pigs can fly, X? I think pigs can fly. So should the rest of the world. It would make life _so much easier_ ," Tony slurred.

"Why are you drunk, Tony?"

"It's better than trying to jump of a bridge. I did that once, but a police man tackled me. Broke my arm too. How dare he," Tony exclaimed. X suddenly grew extremely concerned for his friend's welfare. Tony had tried to commit _suicide_?!

It was thirty minutes before X had finally managed to get Tony to Cain's house and through the door. Immediately, X dragged the teen to the couch and made him sit down.

"A spoon full of sugAR makes the mediceen go down. The mediceen go dowwwwwwwwwn. The mediceen go DOWN!" Tony slurred sang. "What was the name of his other leg?"

X blinked at Tony as he forced the teen to lay down and covered him with a blanket.

" _What_?" As far as X knew, Tony's last two statements weren't even related.

"What was the name of his other leg?"

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

"We need to get you to watch Mary Poppins," Tony stated. "And Wizard of Oz and Nanny Mcphee."

X bent over to push Tony down when the drunk teen tried to sit up.

" _You_ need to lay down," X stated. Tony patted X's head.

"You're hair's soft. I'm a gonna ask Light how he makes hair like that," Tony slurred as he curled up on the couch.

"Uh huh, go to sleep Tony," X ordered. Within moments, the drunk teen was snoring on Cain's couch, blissfully unaware of the concern radiating off of his android friend.

* * *

Tony woke up with a massive headache and the need to empty all contents of his stomach. A person, who he barely recognized as X in his deliria, guided him to a foreign bathroom where he promptly let loose the pressure in his gut and halfway missed the rim of the toilet seat making a mess not only out of himself, but of area as well. The person, X – his head was so fuzzy he had to remind himself who it was that he saw earlier −, rubbed his back comfortingly but otherwise made no other action.

A pair of clothes was placed beside him and a cup of incredibly strong tea was shoved in his hands, X said something and left, closing the bathroom door beside him. Tony spent multiple moments looking at the tea in his hands and the clothes on the floor before determining that he was supposed to _drink_ the tea and put _on_ the clothes not the other way around. He should probably clean himself up a bit too.

It probably took him an hour to work through his massive headache enough to complete all three of the tasks given. He had fallen asleep for a moment after finishing the tea and X, knocking and coming to check on the teen who hadn't made a sound for the last twenty minutes, came to wake him up, saying something along the lines of Tony really needing to finish up and the cleaning droid needing to get in there pronto because apparently, it stunk.

When Tony finally managed to get out of the air offending bathroom, he was guided, gently but with no room for resistance, back to the couch, where more tea was placed in front of him and X, who Tony had designated as his mother hen at this point, bounced back between whatever chore he was doing and checking on Tony's health.

It was around noon when Tony regained enough brain power to realize that he had _no idea where he was and how he got there_.

"X?" Tony asked, his voice harsh. The android walked into the room and gave Tony a questioning glance. "This is probably going to sound really weird, but where am I?"

"My house, and by default, Cain's house."

Tony let the information process before continuing. "And why didn't you just take me home?"

X gave him an exasperated look. "I asked, but you were clearly smashed and you insisted that your house was, and I quote, over the rainbow after having been picked up by a tornado."

"Ah," Tony stated. "So I was quoting movie lines the entire time."

"From what I looked up, yes, you were quoting really _old_ movie lines the entire time."

"I don't remember anything," Tony stated.

"You were pretty drunk. You could hardly even stand."

The two of them were silent for a moment.

"Thanks," Tony said. X nodded.

"Not a problem, but seriously, you're _underage_. I mentioned that to you earlier but the drunk you insisted that as a hacker, you could be _anything_."

Tony snorted. "Sounds like something I would say."

X was silent for a moment in thought before speaking.

"Tony, not all of what you said was movie quotes."

Tony raised an eyebrow in gesture for his friend to continue.

"You may have mentioned that you were suicidal," X stated. Tony winced. "Tony, I know this probably isn't the best time to ask you, when you're recovering and all, but I need to know."

"Oh god, I _talked_ about that? Christ, that was _years_ ago. I don't talk about that with _anybody_."

Tony looked up at X and blinked when he saw the android's horrified face. He sent an apologetic look in the android's direction. "Sorry, I was being a bit of a jerk there. I didn't realize how much this was scaring you. I'm not suicidal anymore. That was . . . eight-nine? years ago? Yeah something like that."

X's face morphed into a unique combination of both confusion and horror, causing Tony to chuckle a little bit.

"Relax. That was before I had something to poor all my frustration into," Tony stared at his hands for a moment and decided that it was probably for the best that he told X everything. "I'm not an only child like everybody thinks, though, it's better for me and well a lot of people if they continue to think that way. I had an old brother, well I still do, but he's no longer a part of my life. Hopefully. My parents saw him as a perfect child and they had me just about nine years after my older brother. Big age gap," Tony paused. "When I was younger, I always knew there was something _different_ about my older brother. At first, I just thought it was normal, but my first week of kindergarten, I had figured out that the level of yelling and anger that radiated from my brother was just . . . _not_ normal. When I turned seven things got more violent, he started beating me, calling me names, . . . this was all when my parents weren't home. And he made _sure_ that I knew that he "loved me", that this was "for my own good" and that I better not tell mom and dad or else the beating tomorrow would be worse. He made me wear long sleeved clothes, just to hide the marks."

Tony leaned back against the couch. "As a child, I believed him. And then, just before I turned eight, he started telling me how I could make it all stop, just as I had begged him to during the beating. He described this nice big tall bridge nearby and that I could just jump off of it and I wouldn't feel any more pain. I told him that that would kill me. He responded with a "but it would get rid of the pain right?" . . . He started beating me more whenever my parents weren't looking. And then finally I had enough. But I guess an eight year old walking down the side of a highway is a little bit suspicious."

There was a resounding silence that penetrated the air after Tony had finished. X was sitting, in a nearby chair, with his eyes closed and his hands pressed firmly together in front of him.

"Uh, X?" Tony asked after the android had not spoken for several moments. X's eyes opened, revealing hardened emerald orbs. Tony blinked. In the months he'd known X, he had _never_ seen the android so _pissed off_ except maybe for that time Nicole had a beer bottle thrown at her.

" _What. The. HELL_ ," X growled out. "Did your parents ever find out what was going on?"

Tony nodded. "Police man took me to the hospital after breaking my arm. They asked for my name, I told them. Then they asked me to pull off my shirt. . . I refused at first and it took a lot of coaxing by the nurse to convince me to do so. My parents came in the room just about that moment, so they were there to see the marks. My mom instantly kneeled in front of me and asked who did it. Took her a while to get the answer from me. Dad went home and picked up my brother. When he saw me without my shirt on, he instantly lunged for me and started screaming at me. Kind of sealed the deal right then and there for him. My brother was smart, but sometimes he had his moments when his anger clouded his brain. He was arrested and taken away and I haven't seen him since. I heard he was nearly released a few years ago, but then he attacked a police guard in a fit of anger and they decided that maybe the therapy wasn't working as well as it seemed."

"Jesus Christ Tony," X sighed, rubbing his hand against his forehead. Tony smiled.

"Damn, if I knew that _that_ was going to make you curse, I would have told you my sob story earlier."

"What the hell is wrong with your brother?!" X exclaimed. Tony shrugged.

"He is a really _really REALLY_ angry child."

X snorted. "No joke . . . are you okay though?"

"Me? I'm fine now. That was years ago. Sometimes I have nightmares about it and looking at the scars gives me flashbacks sometimes, but—"

"Hold up, _scars?!_ I thought you said they were beatings?!"

"He may or may not have pulled a knife on me a few times."

"If he comes back into your life, you let me know and I'll live at your house as a bodyguard, armor and all. I kick his butt if he so much as touches your shoulder."

Tony laughed. "Wow, I never thought I'd see the day that X threatens to harm somebody. Protective much?"

"I'm being _serious_ Tony."

"I know, but this is my way of coping with it. It brings back so many bad memories when I talk about it that joking around every once in a while is the only way I can get through a full sentence without panicking. It's okay now though, seriously. I pore all of my brain power into my studies so that I don't have to think about it too much."

X frowned. "Have you ever considered _seeing_ somebody about this?! I've been told I'm good with words sometimes, but I'm no therapist."

"I did see somebody, the first few years, but I wasn't very cooperative at first because I was still scared of my brother and when I did talk, it didn't really help much."

X groaned into his hands.

"Seriously X, I'm fine now though," Tony insisted.

"I had to carry you to my house from a _bar,_ Tony!"

Tony shrugged. "Yeah, that's all my dad's fault."

X gave him an exasperated look.

"Because the therapist wasn't working, my dad gave me alcohol to try and get rid of the bad memories. I got hooked on the stuff. My parents don't know I still drink."

X cursed again. "You're _underage_."

Tony sighed. "I know."

"There's a _reason_ the law says no drinking till you're twenty one."

"I _know_."

X breathed in deeply and exhaled. The two of them were silent for a moment before X spoke up again.

"How often do you get flashbacks of your brother?"

"Not very often and it's not bad. I can usually pull myself out of it as soon as it starts. Spending so much time with friends has really helped too, even if Nicole's dad makes me remember more than I'd like."

"Then why drink?"

"It's an addiction at this point. I don't really _need_ it. But I . . . I _need_ it at the same time. Does that make sense?"

"Based on what the pod crammed in my head on human psychology and health, yeah, it does. However, that doesn't mean that this can continue," X paused. "The next time you feel like drinking or anything the least bit negative or self-destructive, you call me or knock on my door or just let me know and we'll go get a shit ton of ice cream or binge watch anime or I don't know, raid a candy store. Anything as long it's not harmful."

"Eating a crap load of junk food and sitting on my butt watching tv _is_ harmful."

X gave a halfhearted glare in Tony's direction. " _Tony_."

"What?"

"Promise."

Tony sighed and nodded.

"Yeah, I promise."

"Good." X relaxed his body easing into the chair and Tony blinked. He wasn't aware that X had been so tense and it was a shock at how much the android relaxed as soon as the problem was resolved. For brief moment, Tony was struck with awe at how human like Doctor Light had made him.

Tony smiled and leaned into the couch. He was glad he met X. The android was still learning and he didn't handle every situation perfectly, but for not even being a year old, he was pretty damn good at it. Not to mention that the android seemed to be fiercely determined to protect every one he held dear. And that included Tony.

"Hey X?" The android looked up at him. "Thanks."

X's face softened and he smiled. "No problem."

* * *

Cain knew something was wrong. He had spent _months_ on Sigma's programming so of course he knew that the "rage flashes" as he liked to call them were _not_ a part of Sigma's original programming. They had started ever since Sigma had returned from his fight with Zero and Cain feared the worse.

Sigma was infected with the maverick virus. He was just about sure of it now. But there was nothing he could do. Scratch that. There _was_ something he could do, but he refused to do it. He refused to admit that his most prized invention had fallen victim to a mere virus. He refused to allow his plan, of which Sigma was such a critical part to, to collapse when he was so close to achieving victory.

And yet, he could not ignore the fact of the matter that somehow the coding within Sigma's programming that told him to study X and eventually disable the android in order to study it more closely turned into a study X so that you can kill him later.

Cain wondered for a moment if this maverick virus was really just a negative enhancement of the robot's most desired wishes. It influenced the now maverick to achieve their previously sane selves' wishes by force without any concern for the welfare of others around it. And for reploids, prejudice seemed to be a theme.

He could only hope that maybe it wasn't the virus at all and simply continuously explaining to the reploid about X's worth and the need for the android to remain alive would prevent any future instances.

 **Author's Note: I'm sorry this took so long and I'm sorry it's not the right length, but honestly, I'm really tired of staring at this chapter. I wrote the first half of this before the whole deal with my friend happened and for the longest of times, I really did _not_ want to deal with it. It got too personal. I rewrote just about all of it later on, when the friend issue wasn't so fresh in my head, and decided that yeah, I still wanted to talk about this, but I made it less sensitive for me to write. **

**Long story short, SAT, friend issues, AP tests, and finals with track meets mixed in with all of that. In that order, one after the other. As soon as I got done with one thing, I started to deal with another, so I apologize for the wait. Now that it's summer, it _should_ be easier for me to write, but there's really no guarantee. **

**I'm sorry for any errors or inconsistencies, but because it was summer when I finished this, I could not give it to my editor. She lost her phone so I have no way of contacting her.**

 **My turtle's sick or something now too. Which is really upsetting because I've had her since I was five (I know its a girl because she lays eggs in the fall). But her nose is really red and swollen. She eats fine, hungry all the time, so it's probably not an illness and she just got hurt or something. Part of me wonders if it's stress, because there's a crap load of guppies in her tank because she hasn't been eating them so what started with five, is now 200. I'm worried if she's overwhelmed by too many tank companions, but I seriously have no place to put these guppies other than flushing them down the toilet, but my sister would kill me if I did that. She likes the guppies a little bit too much. It's a fifty gallon tank so the guppies aren't too bad, but it's still a concern and she does still chase them around the tank, she's just slow and they're smart. Which is ironic because I named my turtle Speedy . . . . don't ask, I was five.**

 **Long story short, does anybody know what the swollen red nose means? It's not swollen too badly, but it still makes me worry. I feed her everyday and I give her shrimp and lettuce to go along with the food pellets and she eats all of that. Not to mention, she has the guppies to snack on. Plus, I just cleaned her tank. And she has a rock to perch on (she does yoga when she thinks I'm not watching) and a cave to hide in (she knocks it over all the time though. It makes me mad) and a light to sunbath in. And a filter.**

 **I let her outside on the lawn when it's warm enough. We don't treat our lawn so there's no chemicals and she likes that. She always hisses at me when I go to take her back inside. She doesn't do that when I take her from her tank. I watch her when she's outside too to make sure she doesn't eat anything she's not supposed to. I've had her for twelve years and this is the first time she's appeared to be even remotely not looking well, so I'm concerned. I don't pick her up very often, only that once a week occurrence in the summer when I take her outside or if I'm cleaning her tank and need to move her.**


	11. Pranks and Peanut Butter

_"_ _Don't watch the clock, do what it does. Keep going." –Sam Levenson_

Honestly, X should have seen this one coming. After their little heart to heart talk with X discovering Tony's abusive brother and the teen's desire for alcohol, Tony had become a more regular occurrence in Cain Labs. Of course this was all after Tony had apparently "finished" with school, although somedays, X was well aware that Tony was _not_ supposed to be out of school at one in the afternoon but didn't have the heart to force him to leave.

So he really should have seen it coming. However, he couldn't find it in him to be mad. He didn't really _mind_ what Tony did, he was just annoyed that everyone else thought it was so funny. Fredrick thought it was downright hilarious, and was currently buckling over the lab table, screeching with mirth. Cain seemed to find the situation amusing as well, letting out chuckle every time he so much as glanced in X's direction.

The android himself looked exasperated as he stared down at the blue lab coat in his hands. It was white the day before. Somehow Tony had gotten ahold of X's lab coat when he wasn't using it and proceeded to dye it blue. Which was amazing because X _clearly_ remembered wearing the coat just about all day the day before. And X knew that it was his lab coat too because there was that stain from when he spilled coolant all over his side and forgot about it so the stain remained permanent.

All in all, the situation wouldn't be quite as funny if Tony hadn't managed to break into X's locker as well and dye all of X's _backup_ coats as well. It appeared that X was going to be wearing even more blue than usual for the next few months, until the ever occurring lab accidents burned through the ones he had.

The door to the small lab opened and a familiar face stepped in, humming an upbeat tune and looking quite pleased with himself. The grin on the face grew when he saw X with the lab coat.

"Wow, X. I knew you had a thing for blue, but this just takes the cake."

X rolled his eyes and sighed when he put the lab coat on. "I wouldn't have minded if you didn't dye all of the other coats too."

"Me?! You think _I_ did that?!" the grin became barely concealed as the face morphed into one of shock and mock hurt. "X I am _offended_ that you would think so low of me."

X stared at him and raised an eyebrow. The face twitched, then split, the grin revealing itself once more.

"Considering your track record Tony, I'm actually fairly surprised that you haven't done something like this sooner."

Tony shrugged, the grin plastered on his face. "It was hard, but you're not going to find a single shred of evidence that it was me. I hacked the cameras so there's no way that you can tell."

X looked confused. "But you just _told_ me that you did it so there's no need for that."

"Oh come on, you're not even mad! What are you going to do?"

Cain frowned during the conversation, although internally, he still found the situation quite humorous still.

"You _hacked_ the cameras," Cain asked. Tony turned to him and paled a bit.

"Yeah? I didn't do anything, honest! I just looped the section where I broke into X's locker and dyed his coats."

Cain sighed. "That doesn't really bug me. What bugs me is that a sixteen year old managed to _hack_ into a high tech institute. I'm going to have to tell them to up the security." The old man stood and made his way out the door. X and Tony watched him leave.

"You wanna know what the best part is though?" Tony asked, the grin returning to his face, apparently, he was completely unfazed by Cain's declaration that he was upping the security, perhaps because the teen found some enjoyment in the challenge. X gestured for Tony to continue as he booted up the computer to begin his work.

"You're actually wearing it. This just proves your obsession with blue."

X sighed as Tony cackled, but a small smile appeared on his face, revealing that really, he wasn't all that upset.

* * *

X blinked and looked up from his book as the doorbell rang. Cain was gone and attending a meeting with a few other high end scientists and Frederick was at work, leaving the android to do as he pleased for a few hours before heading to Cain labs. It was a Monday, and early too, so it couldn't possibly have been the mail.

The doorbell rang again and X sighed before standing up, closing the book with a snap and placing it on the coffee table in front of him. He walked across the room and to the hallway that led to the door, letting out a curse when his foot connected with the corner of the wall. It probably didn't hurt as much as it should have if he was human, but it still _hurt._ He grumbled and half limped to the door placing aside his pain for a moment as he opened it, ready to face the visitor with all of the joy and contentment he had left.

The smile, turned to confusion as he stared into the face of his friend, clearly at loss as to why _Tony_ was at his doorstep at eight thirty in the morning.

"Heya X," Tony greeted. X internally groaned. An unusually happy Tony usually meant he already caused trouble or was seriously planning to.

"Tony? Shouldn't you be at school?" X asked.

"Yeah, but I made a promise."

X's cheery demeanor was gone in an instant, replaced immediately with concern.

"My brother called last night, but I figured it was too late to bother you then. And then I slept in this morning because I got crap for sleep and I'm _supposed_ to be going to school, but . . . hey, I know you said we'd go for ice cream and be terribly unhealthy," X frowned. _No_ , that was _not_ the intention. The intention was to be _healthier_ , "buuut I'm not really feeling up for that. What do you say to a prank?"

Wait _what_? That wasn't what he was expecting. X blinked. But at the same time, he really should have been. X raised an eyebrow and leaned against the door frame.

"Depends." Tony's grin grew with excitement. " Who's the target?" X wondered if Tony's face could split if he smiled much bigger.

"You'll be the _perfect_ prank partner. Nobody will expect you because everyone sees you as being so responsible. And because you're with me, nobody will expect _me_ either."

X nodded. The logic did seem pretty sound when he put it that way. "So who's the target?"

Tony grinned. "I'm going big. The school's upped their security since my last prank, but really, that just made me more anxious to pull one off."

"The principal?"

"Hell yeah."

* * *

"I cannot _believe_ you managed to convince me to do this."

"Quit your whining. What's the worst that can happen?"

"The public opinion of me will be _ruined_."

"Oh hush, you've never really liked how famous you were anyways."

"Somehow, I can only see myself becoming more famous after this."

Tony cackled. "True, but you will be so much cooler in my eyes."

X frowned. "Says the guy who was practically drooling over my armor the first time you got a good look at it."

"Shhhhhh. We don't talk about that."

X smirked. "We don't? And here I thought you _loved_ talking about technology."

"X, stop being an asshole. You've been hanging around Zero too much lately."

"I'm helping him develop as a human being."

"He's a freaking reploid."

"Exactly."

". . . I'm going to ask Cain to check your head when we get back because you're not making any sense."

"What are you talking about? I make perfect sense. And did you need help there?" Tony was currently balancing on two chairs suspiciously stacked on top of each other, adding the finishing touches to an elaborate device that was their current prank . . . in the principal's doorway.

"Nope, you'd have no idea what you're doing. Man, if this thing works, that'll be the second time the principal has fallen for this trick."

"How are you not suspended yet?" X asked, genuinely curious.

"I would be, if my grades weren't so awesome. The school just deals with it so that they can claim that they taught me everything I know."

"Somehow that doesn't seem entirely right . . ."

" _And_ my parents bribe them with money, because they're tired of me switching schools."

" _That_ makes more sense."

Tony cackled and leapt from the chairs. "If the principal falls for it again, she's going to be checking her head every time she goes through a doorway." X chuckled. "Now we run."

"Don't you want to put the chairs away?"

Tony rolled his eyes. "Sure."

"How are we going to watch this occur anyways?" X asked as he placed the chairs in the abandoned classroom they stole them from and began following Tony up the stairs and down the hallway to Mrs. Hatchbury's room. She was on break at the moment, so they knew they could enter in without disturbing a class.

Tony held up his phone. "Cameras." He then opened the door to the English teacher's room and leaned in, glancing around for a moment before sneaking forward. gave Tony a curious glance. X, on the other hand, walked in casually and gently closed the door behind him.

"X! What are you doing here without telling me?!" the English teacher stood to give X a suffocating hug. For a moment, X was a bit overwhelmed.

"He was helping me with something," Tony explained. Mrs. Hatchbury groaned after a moment of confusion.

"Oh, no. X. How _dare_ you?! You're supposed to be the responsible one!"

Tony burst out laughing, doubling over and nearly falling out of the chair he had just sat in. Mrs. Hatchbury gave him a concerned glance.

"I knew that was going to happen!" Tony cried out joyfully. "And it was completely _harmless_ Mrs.H. The bucket only had water in it. Plus, we left a bag of spare clothes, that was X's compromise, for the victim to change into."

"Well, at least it wasn't food coloring this time," Mrs. Hatchbury admitted. "How _did_ you get a whole bucket full of food coloring anyways?"

Tony became serious for a moment. "Very carefully."

". . . did you seriously spend hours squeezing those tiny bottles into a bucket?"

". . . . no!" Tony lied and then started fiddling with his phone. Mrs. Hatchbury shook her head.

"On another note, X, it's good to see you. How's life been?"

"Mostly calm except for when _he_ ," X used his head to gesture to Tony as he sat down next to the teen, "comes over."

"Which is all the time," Tony admitted from his phone screen. " _Or_ , when the council comes knocking on X's door and asks him to participate in a study so that they can better replicate his programming."

X nodded in agreement. Mrs. Hatchbury blinked.

"They can _do_ that?!"

Tony raised an eyebrow. "Of course they can, they're the government! They don't give a shit about one individual if it's" he sent down his phone and raised his arms to make air quotes, "for the better of all. Load of bull."

Mrs. Hatchbury sighed. "Just because you're not in class and you brought X, I'm going to ignore your language."

"You can be bribed by bringing X!?" Tony exclaimed. He turned to the android suddenly. "X! You're going to school with me from now on!"

" _Speaking_ of school, shouldn't you be in class?" Mrs. Hatchbury asked. Tony sunk in his seat.

"Maybe?"

" _Anthony_ ," the teacher warned. Tony gulped.

"Just let me watch the principle get soaked and then I'll go to class."

"YOU PULLED THE PRANK ON THE _PRINCIPLE!"_

"Shhhhhh, somebody will hear you!"

X was reminded, for a moment, just how much he liked school.

* * *

Zero was having possibly one of the worst days of his life. His foul mood sent every oncoming scientist and assistant scrambling for cover. The day had started out fine, but then the medic had insisted that Zero take the day _off_ , because he was _scratched_ yesterday. At least, he thought it was just a scratch. The medic on the other hand, insisted that such an injury would take out any normal reploid for several days, regardless of how efficient their systems were. Normally they would be replacing parts with such an injury but because Zero's systems were so strange, they couldn't replace anything. So instead they gave him a whole bunch of nanites filled with materials and confined him to the base for _at least_ a day. The medic would then look over Zero's health after that.

If it was only _confined_ to the base, Zero wouldn't be upset. It would just be like any of his other days off. But _no_ , the medic just _had_ to forbid Zero from even entering the training room and then proceeded to inform _everyone_ , _including_ Sigma, that Zero was not allowed to do _anything_ that could possibly damage him further. Thus, the house arrest. Zero, however, managed to slip out when the guards weren't working and decided to whine to X. Maybe _he_ could convince the medic that Zero was really okay and that his systems had taken care of the normally critical damage overnight.

However, as soon as Zero stepped into X's small lab, ready to whine, his words died in his throat and he stared, blinking every few seconds, his processor whirling to sort out what he was seeing in front of him. Then he laughed, a large guffaw escaping from his lips as his processor caught up to what he was seeing.

Never mind, this was possibly the best day of his life.

X in all of his blue lab coated glory, stared dumbfounded over his lab table at his friend, completely lost as to what had just transpired. Apparently, he had forgotten about the running gag between his friends about X's favorite color.

* * *

(principal prank continued)

X and Mrs. Hatchbury were cheerfully talking about recent events when Tony cursed loudly. The English teacher was about to scold Tony for his language when she saw Tony's paled face.

"It wasn't the principal," Tony whispered. Then, louder, "It was _Sam_."

This time, it was X's turn to pale and he offered a rushed goodbye towards Mrs. Hatchbury as Tony dragged him out the door.

"WE GOTTA GO X, BEFORE SHE FINDS US!" Tony exclaimed.

"What about your classes Tony!" Mrs. Hatchbury exclaimed.

"MY OWN SAFETY IS MORE IMPORTANT!" Tony screamed, running down the hallway, with a dazed android in tow.

Mrs. Hatchbury chuckled to herself as she watched. "It's about time that kid realized the severity of his actions."

* * *

X was only a few weeks old when it happened the first time. Cain just shrugged it off and assumed that maybe the android was just tired or perhaps hadn't been told yet. He made sure to tell him.

But it happened the week after that and nearly happened in a few days following. The next few months was a battle in order to keep it from happening again. X usually caught himself before he did it, but Cain still found the peanut butter in the fridge every once in a while.

The problem was X _knew_ that the peanut butter didn't belong in the fridge; it belonged in the _pantry_. And yet for some reason, his body and subconscious _insisted_ that X should put the peanut butter in the fridge. X didn't have peanut butter very often, but when he did, somebody was usually around to watch him screw the cap back on and absent mindedly walk over to the fridge. Sometimes he stopped right there, groaned and walked over to the pantry, other times, it took the action of opening the door and bringing a hand up to place the offending food item on the refrigerator shelf before he realized what he was doing. _Then_ he groaned and walked over to the pantry as his observer laughed at his strange habit and misery.

It happened again when his friends were over. Sam, Tony, Nicole, and Mark had just gotten off from school and were sitting in X's living room chatting about some assignment. Zero had somehow managed to snag the day off, despite the increase in maverick activity, and was currently lounging on one of the couches, armor off and blonde hair splayed across the fabric and the floor.

X had set out some peanut butter and crackers for them to eat, too lazy to really put anything special together and was now putting them away. Zero had a clear view of X's actions as the couch he was laying on was in direct view of the kitchen, so he saw when X headed for the _fridge_ instead of the pantry.

"X," Zero called out, confused. He'd had peanut butter before and he knew for a _fact_ that it didn't belong in the fridge. "What are you doing?"

X paused. "What-?" Then he realized that he was holding the peanut butter jar with one hand and was reaching for fridge handle with the other. "OH FOR PETE'S SAKE! EVERY _SINGLE_ TIME!"

Zero raised an eyebrow at X's dilemma. The others turned to look at X in confusion.

"What just happened?" Sam asked.

"X almost put the peanut butter in the fridge," Zero stated casually, calmly watching the fellow android groan in frustration in the kitchen.

"Why would he do that?" Tony asked.

"I have no idea."

"Every time! _Every single time_! Whenever I take the peanut butter out I _always_ nearly put it in the fridge! _WHY?!_ " X shouted, clearly having a moment.

Sam laughed the others, joining in a few moments later. After a short bit of chuckles, Tony paused and considered.

"X, have you tried putting a note on the fridge to remind yourself?" he asked.

"Yes, but that's just infuriating because I usually have my hand on the handle when I see it," X moaned.

"What about the jar itself?"

"Tried that and that doesn't work either. I don't really look at the jar when it's in my hand."

The group decided that they couldn't help X with this problem and X decided that maybe peanut butter was more trouble than what it was worth.

* * *

X was weeding his small garden in Cain's backyard when he pulled on a particular weed. The plant jerked, but the roots remained solid in the ground. X pulled harder and the weed snapped, just where the stem met the base of the roots. He groaned, realizing that he'd have to dig up the offending weed and he was just about to do so when a peculiar smell wafted up to his nose.

X frowned and was reminded for a moment about his difficulties with a particular food item. The weed, when broken, smelled like _peanut butter_. He didn't recognize the weed but he'd mainly been studying plants with medical properties, so it didn't shock him too greatly.

He stumbled across a very similar weed a few moments later with a very similar outcome, the stem proved to be too willing to break away from its roots and there seemed to be a very peculiar peanut butter smell that filled the air afterwards.

" _Again_?" X groaned. He sighed and studied the rest of the garden.

The offending weed seemed to make up most of the weed content in the small garden.

"Oh for the love of—."

Peanut butter was starting to become the bane of his existence.

* * *

"You say you don't know what the weed is called, but it smells like peanut butter?" Cain asked amused.

"Yes!" X responded quickly.

"You, a plant nerd, don't know what the weed is called."

"Yes I—wait a minute." Cain laughed loudly as X frowned. "Now hold up!" the android started.

* * *

He'd been babysitting the dog for well over a week now. The owner had been a friend of Cain's and was currently on a two week long trip. He wouldn't be back for a few days. The dog in question was old and needed a daily dose of medications. However, the dog wouldn't eat any of them without one particular item.

Peanut butter.

X was starting to hate the food item, despite its pleasing taste.

Now he was consistently reminded of his inability to place the food away properly, despite being repeatedly reminded and constantly aware of the issue. Still he took the jar out, unscrewed it, and placed it on the dog's medicine. But today posed a new problem as X stared into the peanut butter jar and the dog waited patiently at his feet.

The jar was empty and X was getting increasingly irritated with whoever thought it was a good idea to place the empty peanut butter jar back into the pantry. He glanced down at the small dog who was looking up at him expectantly before glaring back at the jar.

The owner had been _adamant_ that the dog should have his medicine. X would have to get more.

He glanced outside. It was borderline hurricane weather out there, lighting was flashing and the wind was throwing buckets of wind at the windows. X was made of _metal_. But he couldn't wait, the owner was insistent that the dog should have his medications in the _morning_.

He really hated peanut butter.

X moaned to himself quietly and dropped the offending jar in the sink, before shuffling toward the door and placing his rain coat on, bracing himself for the oncoming hell.

He prayed to whatever god there was that he wouldn't get struck by lightning.

He really _really_ hated peanut butter.

* * *

Really he should have learned by now. It was _months_ after the problem had first revealed itself and yet here he was, standing in front of the open refrigerator door with the peanut butter jar in his hands.

"God freaking damnit."

* * *

Cain watched X, a forgotten spoon of cereal held hallway to his mouth. The android had decided that he wanted to eat waffles smeared with peanut butter that morning and Cain was currently waiting for the inevitable.

And the inevitable came quickly. X was currently walking over to the refrigerator door, with a familiar jar in his hand.

"The pantry X!" Cain yelled. X paused.

"SERIOUSLY!? _AGAIN?!"_

Cain wondered if the android was really just doing it on purpose.

X wondered if he would ever be freed from the curse.

* * *

It was midnight and somebody was pounding on the door. Cain yelled at X to go see who it was because the scientist was _not_ going to try and convince his old bones to get up when somebody perfectly fit and able was available. X complied, fully expecting to see Tony again—the teen had visited X's house several times during the night before—but was shocked to see that the person in the doorway, standing in the rain and the darkness, was none other than a soaked, grumpy, and fully armored Zero.

X welcomed the android inside, locking the door back up before turning around and paused when he inspected Zero more carefully in the light. The maverick hunter's armor was damaged, he'd probably just come from some sort of fight, but that wasn't what concerned X. Zero's usually well-kept and flowing hair was a matted mess, held together in knotted clumps by a gooey substance. X reached over to inspect the mess and surprisingly, Zero didn't stop him, despite his clearly wounded pride.

"I need help," Zero stated, embarrassed. X nodded, dumbfounded.

"I can _see_ that, but what on earth _is it_?" He was at loss to determine what was holding the maverick hunter's hair together in the matted clumps.

"There was a fight in a gum factory." X blinked and suddenly his mind brought forth a memory of Sam complaining about a very similar problem and Nicole bringing up a solution that had apparently worked because Sam was fine the next day.

"Up the stairs and two doors down is the bathroom. I'll be up in a sec, I just need to grab something to help."

Zero gave X a curious glance. "What?"

X grinned. "Peanut butter!"

It took hours to get every last piece out of Zero's hair. The maverick hunter grumbled the whole time because his communicator was buzzing nonstop—he eventually told them to shut up and that he would be back at the base whenever he could get there—and it was taking _so long_. He could get the pieces that were stuck on the lower section of his hair, but the ones close to his scalp were up to X to get rid of. There was just so much and X had to convince Zero that cutting it all off was a bad idea. Zero insisted that it would grow back quickly anyways, but X refused to allow the maverick hunter to take the easy way out. Besides, in order to cut it all off, Zero would have to be _bald_ for a short while and X was horrified at the idea. It might work for Sigma, but neither one of them saw it working for Zero.

In the end, X was out of peanut butter that morning and Zero smelled like peanuts for the next few days. A few of the new recruits made fun of him for it, but a demonic grin and a charging buster usually shut them up pretty quickly.

Zero never admitted it, but he actually _preferred_ smelling like peanut butter over waiting for his hair to grow back.

And X was forced to admit that maybe peanut butter was worth all the trouble it caused.

He still almost placed the peanut butter in the fridge after Zero left and he still cursed when he realized what he was doing.

* * *

It was a good morning for Cain. X had stayed overnight at the labs so the old scientist hadn't been woken up by X's loud cursing involving a food item. He whistled happily as he took out the particular jar and started making himself some toast. A peanut butter and banana sandwich sounded good to him today.

He closed the lid once he'd finished making his sandwich and absent mindedly began putting all of the items away as he ate his sandwich. Banana peel in the garbage, knife and plate in the sink, peanut butter in the . . . fridge.

"GOD DAMNIT X! THIS BETTER NOT BE CONTAGIOUS!"

 **Author's Note: Again, I apologize for any errors. Just let me know and I'll fix them. The weird bug that prevent me from writing "dr" is back; this time with "mrs", so that's why there's a space between "mrs" and "Hatchbury". I may have missed one so don't be too mad. It wasn't my fault.**

 **And the peanut butter thing has happened to me. I don't know why this is such a problem for me but every time I go to put peanut butter away, I nearly put it in the fridge. And those weeds happened to me today and I just needed to write it down, hence this chapter being produced so quickly. I was inspired and felt bad about being so late so I cranked out a whole chapter in one day, a process that usually takes several. It really helped that it was summer and I had the time.**

 **However, I'm not completely sure about what I'm doing for the next chapter so it probably won't get done by the end of the week and I'm going to be gone next week so I wouldn't expect a new chapter for at least two or three weeks.**


	12. Because Zero Needs Screen Time Too

_"_ _When you reach the end of your rope, tie a knot in it and hang on." –Franklin D. Roosevelt_

It was simple. _Simple_. And yet _why_ was it _so difficult_? He glanced over at his friend, and snorted when he saw that the said brunette was singing and _dancing_ to some upbeat pop song while mixing ingredients. He wondered for a moment if his friend did this when Cain was home.

Refocusing on the task at hand with a sigh, he glanced down at the cardboard box in his hand and struggled to determine what the tiny lettering was telling him to do. He wasn't much for taking orders, especially not ones from a _box._ And as an added affect, he had no idea what some of the tools labeled on the box were. He looked up at the cupboard where he knew one of the tools were located. Somehow it didn't make much sense to him though. Cups came in all sorts of different sizes.

He was so focused in his pondering that he failed to see that his friend had stopped singing and was now watching him with a confused and concerned gaze.

"Zero? Are you okay?"

"I have no clue how to cook." It took him a full minute to realize that he'd just said that out loud. His friend, the sweet cinnamon roll that he was (Zero was just lucky he didn't say _that_ out loud), just smiled sheepishly at him. And when Zero looked down at him, he was reminded for a moment just how _short_ the fellow android was.

"Sorry, I forgot you'd never done this before. I kind of just assumed. The others do stuff like this all the time with me."

"Correction, I _can't_ cook."

"Have you tried before?"

"No."

"You don't know for sure until you try. Could I see the box? I'll help."

Zero gladly handed the offending item over and watched as X's eyes scanned the box quickly.

"How about you get all the ingredients listed? It's just brownies so all you'll have to grab are the eggs, and oil. Oil's in the pantry by the way."

Zero grunted and moved to do as he was told, wondering _why_ he'd signed up for this. Seriously, he was a _battle_ robot, not a _house maid_. With that in mind, Zero really wondered about just _what_ X had been programmed for. Because right now? X only seemed to do whatever he wanted. He was _good_ at whatever he wanted. Surely the android must have _some_ sort of primary function? Zero glanced back at his friend as his hand closed around the large container of Canola oil. X's primary function just seemed to be X. Just whoever X wanted to be. Zero found the idea to be inefficient, but largely fascinating. His own systems were programmed for war, and it often took him a long time to sometimes realize that he _wasn't_ on the battlefield. X seemed to help wake him up from his almost hypnotic battle trances. In fact, Sigma had begun _calling_ in the android whenever Zero wasn't snapping out of it.

It wasn't that he hurt anybody or caused damage to anything . . . alright maybe that was a lie. He _did_ in fact break a few things every once in a while when he was stuck in one of his trances. But all in all, he was mostly harmless to other maverick hunters. He was just twitchy, and trigger happy and hell, many fellow hunters (experienced ones too) had told him that he was downright terrifying.

Shaking his head, Zero decided that he had spent long enough standing in front of the pantry and he needed to move. He had a job to do after all. Find eggs. Clearly a simple task.

Zero opened the door of the fridge and paled significantly. Clearly a task for a _god_.

"X, help." _I wasn't built for this_ , his mind hissed rather helpfully. X bounded over and Zero had to double take at the happy energy the android was emitting. X leaned over to duck his head under Zero's arm and look inside the fridge.

"Oh," the android blinked. "Yeah that's a problem. Fredrick what the hell."

There were pizza boxes _everywhere_ in the fridge. Both gaping androids looked at the display in wonder and shock. Seriously, how did one even _get_ that much pizza without knowing when to stop? X had discovered Fredrick's almost unhealthy affiliation with pizza last month, but the box count had maintained a steady one. Unfortunately, X forgot to consider that the mailing office had their party last night. X ducked back under Zero's arm and went around to the other side.

"Here just hold these and I'll try and find the eggs." X dumped a five box stack into Zero's arm and promptly kept on adding to the pile, thereafter. Zero had to twist and turn to keep X from stacking the boxes the wrong way. The android wasn't really paying attention to what he was doing. By the time X had found the egg carton, Zero was nothing more than legs, and a small fraction of a waist. X glanced back at his friend and gaped in awe when he fully realized the extent of the box pile his friend was carrying.

"That's amazing, Zero. I would have dropped all of them by now. My balance isn't _that_ good."

Said maverick hunter turned to give X a looked that clearly stated he wasn't sure how he felt about being good at carrying pizza boxes. X laughed and began to pull the boxes off. About halfway through (Zero's head and shoulders were only just barely visible), X pulled a little too hard and the stack began to topple. Zero's left hand snapped out from beneath the stack to catch the top and prevent it from falling over, just as his right slid over to support the pile from the bottom. X smiled sheepishly as Zero's eyebrow raised and he turned his head ever so slightly.

"Smooth," the maverick hunter supplied, voice neutral. X spun around quickly to hide his embarrassment as Zero laughed. When all the boxes had been put away, X wrinkled his nose at the maverick hunter.

"You're an asshole."

"X, you do realize how many people tell me that in a day? Come up with something new."

"That aside, we have eggs!" Zero decided not to comment on how weird that statement sounded.

"Only after venturing into the pits of pizza hell. _Why_ do you have so many boxes by the way?"

"Fredrick's borderline obsessed with the stuff."

Zero sighed. "Are _all_ of you mentally unstable about something?"

X shrugged. "To be honest, I don't think anybody's normal if they _aren't_ weird about something."

Zero hummed in agreement and watched as X pulled out various items from the cupboards beneath the sink.

"So the first thing you do is mix everything together. These are boxed brownies so while they don't taste as nice as homemade ones, they're much easier to make. It will be a nice icebreaker for you in cooking. So just dump the contents of the bag in and put the eggs in with it. I'll show you how to measure the water and oil when you're done.

And so Zero did just that. He dumped the contents of the bag into the mixing bowl and placed two eggs right on top. X blinked, before rubbing a hand up his face and through his hair, giving an amused glance between Zero and the mixing bowl.

"Hey, uh Zero?" The maverick hunter turned. "We don't eat egg shells." Zero blinked and then pulled the eggs back out of the pan.

"What am I supposed to do then?"

"Crack 'em, butlet'sdothatinabowlfirst," X rushed out when he saw that Zero was about to crush the egg over the bowl in his fist. X slid over to the right to grab a cereal bowl. "Here, let me show you with one and then you can try with the second one."

Zero watched as X took one of the eggs and cracked it on the side of the bowl before pulling it open with both hands. The contents of the egg dropped neatly into the bowl.

"The trick is to try and not break the shell too much so that when you pull it apart, you don't have any shell bits in with the yolk. Your turn." X slid the bowl over to the maverick hunter. When Zero cracked the egg it was sliced in half by the edge of the bowl. The shell disintegrated in Zero's hand and there were bits all over the counter. Both occupants of the room blinked.

" . . . How about let's wash your hands and you can try again, but with less force this time."

X handed Zero a fresh egg when the reploid returned. "A lot less force this time."

Zero obeyed, slightly frustrated by the difficulty of cooking. The egg merely tapped the side of the bowl without so much as denting.

"A little bit more." Zero tapped the egg again, with more force this time and there was a decent sized crack in the egg when he pulled it away from the bowl. He almost panicked right then and there because he had completely forgotten the neck step. Luckily, X was there to save him.

"Hold it over the bowl and just gently pull the two halves of the shell apart."

Zero complied and was largely satisfied when the yolk dropped into the bowl, mostly intact. There was a little bit of shell bits, but compared to the catastrophe that was his first try, it wasn't bad.

The rest of the process continued in a similar fashion. Zero discovered that a cup didn't actually mean a _drinking_ cup; it was really a unit for measuring. He was completely bewildered by this fact. _Why_ did they name two kitchen terms the _same thing_?

Also, teaspoons and tablespoons. Just _why_? All in all, Zero was incredibly relieved when X closed the lid to the oven and proudly announced that all they had to do now was wait. At least waiting was something he was _programed_ to do. So Zero waited, crouching down in front of the oven like a predator waiting to make its kill. X gave his friend a weird look.

"You do know a watched pot never boils right?"

* * *

Zero huffed as he walked down the side walk in frustration. His armor was off for once (X would be proud) and he merely walking around town with no particular destination in mind. He had originally left headquarters to vent his frustrations to X, but the android was apparently not at home. He vaguely recalled X telling him earlier that week that he was going to be leaving sometime for an excavation, but he hadn't been paying very much attention. X's friends were in school, so he couldn't resort to them as a second option. That aside, there wasn't anybody else he could talk to.

It was funny how a few months with X could turn you from a spiteful asshole so a social loving pansy. Really, a few months ago, he would have been perfectly fine with sulking by himself, but no, X just _had_ to show him the joys of knowing somebody that actually gave a shit. The people passing on his right gave him a wide girth as he grumbled to himself. Sighing, he made quick decision to walk into the park instead of being constantly being reminded of how intimidating he was.

That was another thing X had changed about him. A few months ago, Zero wouldn't have given a shit about what people said about him. He still didn't, not really. But he was starting to take notice of just _how many_ people found him intimidating or simply just _didn't_ like him. It hurt, a little bit. More so than he cared to admit. Which was why he enjoyed being around X so much. The android didn't care if Zero was in a foul mood (a common occurrence) and decided to be a complete asshole; somehow, the brunette knew he didn't truly mean any of it.

Zero plopped down on an unused park bench with a frustrated huff. He pulled the communicator out of his pocket and willed it to start beeping. He was bored, frustrated, and in desperate need to tear something apart, but Sigma had told him that if he broke the training simulator again, he'd never be allowed near the thing in the future. What better thing to take your rage out on than a few idiotic mavericks? Surely Sigma didn't need _them_ in one piece too?

There was a feint whistling and Zero's systems went into overdrive as his hand snapped up to catch something that had been thrown at his face.

"Sorry sir! We didn't mean to throw it at you!" a child's voice, barely hearable over the blare of his own systems, registered in his ears. He ignored the voice, instead focused on keeping his systems from snapping into that hypnotic battle trance. X's words of advice pounded in his head. _Analyze_ , he screamed at his internal programming. _Analyze_ before you assume that it means war! It took quite some time for him to haggle the alarms down to a much more manageable level.

"Sir? Could I have my ball back?" Zero blinked, then his eyes focused back on the object in his hand. A football, clearly not a weapon of mass destruction. He almost numbly handed the ball back to the thirteen year old.

"Sorry kid, I seem to be pretty out of it," Zero apologized and watched the boy go back to his friends, unnerved by how quickly his systems had been thrown into battle mode just because a baseball had been thrown at his face.

He frowned and got up with a huff and more grumbling. The only place he could truly fit in was the battle field. Everywhere else, he was nothing more than a threat to its security. He made to start heading back to headquarters when a small hand tugged at his shirt. He turned to see the boy with the ball.

"Sir? I was wondering if you wanted to play with us. You see, we're one player short."

"I don't know how to play kid; it wouldn't be a good idea."

"So? We can teach you!"

"I'm a _reploid_ kid. It _wouldn't be a good idea_ ," Zero all but hissed, his bad mood leaking into his voice even though he had tried his best to stop it. The boy shrugged.

"I kind of figured you were. Most people don't have reaction times like that. So can you play?" Zero blinked down at the child.

"Kid, you woke up battle protocols when you threw the _ball_ at my face. It's not a _good idea_ to have a _maverick hunter_ play football with human children," Zero tried to explain.

The boy blinked at him excitedly.

"You're a maverick hunter?! That's so cool! You're like a hero!"

He didn't know why but the comment made him bristle in anger.

" _I'm_ _not a hero kid,"_ he growled out. The boy winced at his tone. "Look, I appreciate the thought, but I was built for war, playing ball games is not going to go well. Just get lost kid."

The boy looked incredibly downcast at Zero's response, but nodded anyway and ran back to his friends.

Zero refused to think about the growing pit of guilt that was eating away at his stomach as he walked away. He couldn't play football, especially not with _human children_. There was just no way.

 _You don't know for sure until you try_. X's words from earlier that week hit him like a train to the gut. His feet stopped and then started going back in the direction he'd came before his mind had fully registered what was happening.

"You know what kid? I'll give it a shot!"

"REALLY?!"

Zero couldn't help but grin at the enthusiasm of the boy and his friends when he agreed.

* * *

Contrary to most beliefs, Zero wasn't really crazy or blood thirsty. It wasn't really blood thirst that drove him or made him itch with excitement every time he was sent on a mission. No, it was a desire to test his strength against others and to get stronger while doing so. He liked to feel his systems racing in excitement as he fought a battle that seemed like he should loose. He was disappointed with his enemies nearly every single time. But at least they temporarily got rid of his boredom.

If he was human, he'd be considered an adrenaline junkie.

So he wasn't really as blood thirsty as everyone seemed to think. Battle just gave him a sort of thrill. He didn't entirely like tearing things a part. It just sort of . . . happened. Zero didn't really have a good handle on his strength yet, and often, he ended up tearing apart and destroying something he didn't mean to. It seemed to him sometimes that it was his purpose, to destroy. He didn't actually mind it. Sure there were things he would have preferred _not_ to destroy, but there was nothing that he truly didn't want to damage. Except of course, X.

It was X that became his first real friend, X that showed him the world really wasn't as black and white as he cut it out to be. Zero had originally separated the world into the strong and the weak. He was supposed to destroy the strong and . . . protect the weak? He wasn't entirely sure what he was supposed to do with the weak. They really just existed to him.

And then X showed him that the weak could be far stronger than he thought if he just gave them the chance. The weak could be smart, strong, and powerful if they truly wanted to be, but they just chose not to, like X. Zero _knew_ that X was stronger than he let on, yet for some reason, the maverick hunter felt a desire to protect the blue android whenever he was around. Because his systems had pegged X as being weak. But something told Zero that X was more than that.

X at first was the only one that he felt this urge to protect. After a few months, that urge developed into a need to protect everything X stood for as well.

And then all the sudden, the battles that had previously bored him became a fight that sent his systems scrambling to give him the most pleasant outcome. Because the fight no longer became a battle to see who was stronger, it also became a battle to _protect_. Because X believed in humanity and that meant that Zero would have to protect it.

 **Author's note: I apologize for any language or just curt wording in the above chapter but that's Zero for you. Also, no editor, most of this was written while I was sick. Just let me know if you see anything and I'll fix it.**

 **So I've hit a road block of sorts with this story (if you haven't already noticed). It's not that I don't have ideas, it's just that the ideas I do have are mainly centered around future (canon) characters and plots lines that are WAY ahead. So I've been writing portions of chapters that probably won't come around till next _year_ at the earliest, cause I'm really slow at writing. How against it would you guys be if I were to give you guys a taste of what is to come in the next chapter (mostly nostalgic moments, no plot spoilers)? What would that entail? Lots of shouting. Lots of jokes I'm sure you will all find absolutely hilarious. Lots of insanity and ridiculous and a written out story version of the Megaman X chat fic I posted on Archive of our Own. Honestly, just the interactions I have planned between all the major characters of Megaman X is (in my opinion) unique and amazing and I'm _dying_ to show you but it's _so_ far away. Beyond just that, I have so many amazing things planned for Axl and Alia and poor poor Signas, but this story is already 60,000 words long and _I haven't even started the main plot_. Not to mention Douglas and Life Saver and hell, this isn't even the X series, but I work with (kinda) the _Guardians_ too and I'm so freaking impatient it's killing me. If you thought anything you've read so far was ridiculous, just wait till I introduce Alia; she's a new brand of hilarity that I have never seen anybody attempt for her yet. BUT ALIA DOESN'T COME UNTIL LIKE THE THIRD OR FOURTH GAME I DON'T REMEMBER BUT IT MAKES ME SAD BECAUSE I'M TRYING TO KEEP THINGS MOSTLY CANON.**

 **That aside, X is still a cinnamon roll, Zero is a moody child, and everybody else just exists. (for now)**

 **ALSO ALL YOU PEOPLE YOU HAVE REVIEWED: YOU GUYS ARE AMAZING!**


	13. Mega

_"_ _The truth is you don't know what is going to happen tomorrow. Life is a crazy ride, and nothing is guaranteed." –Eminem_

 **Author's Note: I'd say you guys are lucky to get two chapters in one day but this one is so short it doesn't really count. XMarkZX brought up something my mind has been telling me for a while now, but I just haven't gone through with because I felt like I needed to take it slow in order to get a particular point across. That being said I still think I pulled it(it being the point) off with this chapter. I apologize for anything and everything that you are about to read.**

 _BRRRRRIIIIIINNNNNNGGG!_

X looked up from the book he was reading to stare at the phone. When it rang a second time, he stood to retrieve it. Who would be calling at this time in the night? It was three in the morning!

"Hello?"

" _X, this you?"_ X blinked at the voice on the phone. What was Zero doing calling at this time of the night. Was something wrong?

"Zero?"

" _Yeah."_

"Is there something wrong?"

" _. . .yeah_ ," Zero paused before continuing, " . . . _there was a maverick attack at a super market this morning. I was sent in, but I was on the other side of the city and a whole lot of people were dead by the time I got there._ "

"Shit, again?"

" _X . . . Shit man, I don't know how to tell you this."_

X couldn't explain the feeling of dread that was starting to form in his stomach.

" . . . _I recognized Tony as one of the ones killed."_

X's processor nearly shut down and he froze. He couldn't breathe, couldn't think.

"W-what?" His voice came out as nothing more than a whisper.

" _Tony's dead, X. I'm sorry."_

Tony. Tony was dead. His processor whirled to believe that _Tony_ was gone.

. . . It was a long time before X mustered up the energy to swallow.

"Where?" he demanded.

" _Megamarket. But X-!"_

"Zero, I want to verify."

" _That's not-."_

"Zero," X announced firmly.

 _"_ _. . . alright. It's rough out here X. Are you sure you want to-?"_

" _Zero_." X's gaze had hardened to determination.

" _Yeah. I'll be waiting."_

X only barely spared the time to write a quick note to Cain before rushing out the door.

* * *

Zero nervously tugged at one of his many strands of his hair, sparing a glance at Sigma speaking to the cops every once in a while. It had been a bad night. There had been increasingly more of those lately. Zero had been getting less and less breaks this last month and it was all due to the rise in maverick activity. He frowned as his eyes caught a glimpse of yet another white bagged body being carried away.

He hadn't known Tony very well. Sure, he'd talked to the kid a couple of times and he did like the teen. He was funny and energetic and provided a spark in the air. However, he wasn't all that close to the teen. Not like X was. Which was why Zero believed that the android needed to know first thing.

Sigma had reluctantly agreed to the plan even though it went against regulations. Zero wasn't known for being sentimental, so when the red armored reploid went up to him and asked if X could come on scene because he'd recognized one of the dead, Sigma had agreed. The most Zero ever asked for was more battle time, so this was such an alarming change of pace that he felt inclined to agree.

The red reploid stared remorsefully at the flickering Megamarket sign. The "market" bit was completely gone, while the "Mega" flickered weakly in the dead of night. The word whispered to him, telling him something more, but he merely shook his head. He'd been hearing a lot of voices lately and thankfully they had been decreasing in frequency, because some of them were _very_ concerning. The introduction of a new blaring light snapped him back into attention. He straightened and bounded forward when a taxi pulled up and a familiar face stepped out. X ducked under the caution tape, ignoring the protests of the police, which were quickly silenced by Zero's gloved hand.

X spared Zero a small smile, but couldn't manage much more than that.

Wordlessly, Zero led his friend through a mess of sheet covered bodies and burning piles of rubble, through the barely recognizable long rows of trashed products, until he stopped next to a single white covered mass in a sea of similarly disguised bodies at the back of the former supermarket. X nodded and Zero bent down to pull the sheet back to reveal the face. Still green eyes and a messy head of auburn hair stared zombie like ahead. X stood there stunned and quickly Zero covered the face back up and rushed to the android's side, helping him to sit on the ground.

"Shit," X muttered. " _Shit_."

"X-," Zero started. X shook his head, clearly not in the mood to think and wordlessly, Zero settled down beside him. He was struggling with the idea himself. Just over a week ago, he had resolved to protect humanity so as to protect X's ambitions and beliefs, but clearly he had failed. Tony was dead and Zero had not been there to save him. A police officer ushered them away, telling them that they needed to clear the bodies, and Zero guided X to a combat vehicle wear they could sit and continue their silent vigil. The vigil continued for a while before Zero determined that he had to do something about the guilt eating away at him. "X, I'm sorry. I-."

"I should have joined weeks ago when I thought of it." Zero was stunned, turning slightly to look at the android. "I thought about it. I thought about the increase of maverick attacks and how something needed to be done before somebody I cared about got hurt. But I was determined that I could figure out a way to cure everybody. I was selfish and naïve and just so _stupid_ for believing that. God, I'm such an idiot."

"X, it's not your fault. You're not a maverick hunter."

"I _could_ have been."

"X, things were crazy tonight. We were spread too thin. There was nothing anybody could have done. It wasn't the maverick hunter's fault. It wasn't yours."

X sighed and leaned back against the seat of the car.

"I know, but I keep thinking what if," he said. Zero smiled remorsefully as his gaze focused on the roof of the car.

"So have I, X. So have I."

Another silence filled the air. Zero played with a strand of his hair nervously. X was upset and that did _not_ sit well with him. He understood _why_ the android was upset and he also understood that nothing could have been done. But something about watching the android get so upset over a person he hadn't even known for a year put his systems in a serious state of distress. He wanted to fix this. He _needed_ to fix this. He just didn't know how.

"Please tell me the maverick was detained." Zero decided that lying left a very bitter taste in his tongue no matter how much he knew X hated violence, so he chose not to.

"Couldn't. Was too big to restrain. Had to take him down. I personally fired a point blank shot at its I.C."

X nodded. He stared out the window and at the front of the market, the flickering light filling his body with steady resolve. "I'm signing up tomorrow."

"X, you hate fighting."

"I do, but I don't have a choice. I'm tired of blundering around in the lab, hoping to find the cure. People are dying and I'm not any use in the lab with that sort of thing."

Zero nodded. "We'll figure out why this is happening. I promise. Someday we'll figure it out and then both humans and reploids can coexist in peace without having to be in constant fear of each other."

"Now that would be an Arcadia." Zero almost relaxed at the lighter mood that had set in.

"Arcadia? That sounds like a shit storm waiting to happen."

"Isn't everything?" X commented dryly.

Zero internally winced. Leave it to be his mouth that brought back the foul mood.

"We need to let the others know," X commented and as he turned to leave, Zero caught a glimpse of red streaks running down the sides of the android's face as he left the vehicle. Zero paused midway in his motion of getting out of the vehicle, wondering when X had started crying. He'd been staring at the ceiling so it explained why he hadn't seen anything, but surely he would have heard something?

"X, wait," Zero rushed out of the car. "Maybe you should give it a moment. One of the police officers will call them. They're trained for this."

"Zero, I _have_ given it a moment."

"Have you really?" The maverick hunter stepped closer and in one fluid motion, pulled X close to his chest. "'Cause, I know you X, and you are far too emotional to just walk this off. Let it out, X."

X's body was shaking with sobs before his head had even touched Zero's shoulder.

"Damnit Zero, I don't want anybody to ever have to go through this."

"I know X, I know. We'll get through this. I promise."

In front of him, Zero watched with almost impartial fascination that the "Mega" had steadied to become a single glowing bright light.

 **Author's Note: Again, this chapter is painfully short, but adding more to this just didn't work. It took away from the idea.**


	14. Chapter 14

_"If you could kick the person in the pants responsible for most of your trouble, you wouldn't sit for a month." –Theodore Roosevelt_

Author's note: I have no clue what I just wrote, but I really needed to finish this chapter.

 _Two months later_

He didn't really know how he progressed from a C level grunt to a B so quickly. He supposed it probably had something to do with the fact that his X buster packed a bit more punch than standard reploids. Then again, a lot of reploids didn't even _have_ a buster. First off, it was completely unnecessary for a civilian reploid to have a plasmic weapon in their inventory. Secondly, suppling busters for every maverick hunter recruit was incredibly expensive, especially since the death toll was so high, which was one thing he never understood

In essence, reploids were computers and had a hard drive. Which meant, that their systems could store information and keep it even after power had been removed. Which also meant, that as long as a reploid's I.C. chip wasn't destroyed, _you could rebuild_ _them_. The government _wasn't_. They were just writing off reploids as dead even though it was just their bodies that were destroyed and then producing new ones because they could.

X had whined about it several times to Cain, Zero, and his friends. He even whined to Sigma about it once. The commander just shook his head at the android's protests and stated that he could do nothing about it. X promptly wrote a protest to the governor later that day.

If X picked up every reploid I.C. chip still intact that he passed, he could save over twenty reploid lives within a week. In fact, he had done so, for about a month, before X's roommates complained. Apparently a box full of reploid I.C. chips was a little bit unsettling and Zero had to step in to talk to X before the entire base thought X was some mass reploid killer. X's dorm hallway thought that the android was some crazy maverick for months and even after then it had been exaggerated and became a story to terrify new recruits with. It had gotten so bad that most recruits refused to bunk with X and the android got his own room simply because everyone was terrified of him.

Zero laughed his butt off for weeks. X was embarrassed but really could not understand what was wrong with what he did. Sigma just told the android to bring any I.C. chips he found to the base mechanic and _not_ to put them in his room. It was a lost cause to convince the android to just stop "saving" the reploid chips to begin with. X just made a bigger fuss about it.

In the end, under the watchful gaze of a blue android, Sigma ended up contacting a reploid factory who agreed to take in the I.C. chips and rebuild their bodies.

Needless to say, X's experience with the Maverick Hunters was far from average. Beyond just being promoted almost right away and his experience with the dorms, people in general were just in awe that the father of all reploids had decided to join an organization that had an had a low average life span for reploids. The scientists stationed at base had tried to convince X to come down to the labs for some studies several times, after hearing from Cain that reploids were an imperfect copy of X's systems. They wanted to figure out what made Cain think that X was so different.

At first, X didn't understand really what the scientists were asking of him, and he almost agreed. Luckily, Zero chased them away and explained to the android what it was that the scientists wanted to do. X shocked by the idea, later approached the scientists and informed them that his systems were designed to be impossible to copy. The scientists reluctantly stopped bugging him about it.

Zero had become X's mentor throughout the starting days. The red reploid was shocked at how little X actually knew about fighting and the way battles worked. No that wasn't quite right. X knew far more than he let on, but the android had far better aim when he was firing at targets rather than actual reploids. It was a mental thing, Zero realized. If X simply let go of the part of him that held onto humanity, he would be by far the best maverick hunter in the world. _But then, he wouldn't be X_ , Zero concluded. He couldn't see X without those human qualities. That was why Zero tried to learn more about X, so that he could teach the android how to fight effectively and work around all of those morals. That and Zero just simply _liked_ being around the android.

X seemed to be one of the only few people who saw Zero as a friend and not a weapon of mass destruction. It was refreshing and the more Zero stayed around X, the more he found himself developing a personality. He'd always been on the quiet side(albeit still a bit of an asshole), but recently, he found himself joking around more. In fact, he pulled a prank on the fifth unit just over a month ago and the investigation had lasted two weeks because they couldn't link the evidence they'd found to any suspects, which didn't include Zero. Sure, most people understood that Zero was an asshole, but they had yet to realize that Zero did in fact enjoy a little bit of fun beyond just pissing people off. Technically, pranking still pissed people off, but the maverick hunter preferred to think that it was more ethical than spouting off random crap to their faces.

When X figured it out a few days after the event, he merely shook his head and replied that if they hadn't figured it out already, there was no way that he was going to help them. Zero merely grinned in response and took it as an initiative to dye the six unit's uniforms red. Except that it wasn't red, because the uniform's original color was green and it had mutated into a sickly gray after Zero's alterations.

X had through his hands up in response and said that if they refused to believe that Zero wasn't _always_ out for blood, they'd better get it soon.

Sigma had finally figured it out after the third prank and called a sheepish Zero into his office that day, proceeding to ask Zero just _how_ the red reploid had been corrupted by X's innocence. When Sigma confronted X about it, the android replied that Zero had always been like that. Most people just didn't have the courage or patience to try to get to know that. Both Zero and X found the situation entirely hilarious afterwards. Zero didn't find it so funny the next day though, when he had latrine duty.

Needless to say, both X and Zero were the cause for all of Sigma's headaches for weeks. After the tenth prank, (Zero called it battle training. He had to get recruits ready for anything. Sigma informed him that it was unnecessary terrorism.) Sigma discovered that X usually knew what Zero was going to do _before_ it happened and therefore, he pegged X just as responsible for Zero's crap as the demon reploid himself was.

X protested, but ultimately decided that he wasn't going to betray his friend and made no changes to the way he did things, beyond just the fact that he did rig Zero's door to dump hair dye on him as he walked through in retaliation.

Zero whined and glared at X for days because his hair was pink. X merely replied to questioners that if the maverick hunter hadn't figured out that he could dye his hair to a more reasonable color or simply just _cut_ it, than he wasn't going to help him. (At the end of the week, X gave into Zero's whining and yelled at the reploid to use _logic_.)

At prank number fifteen, Sigma simply gave up and assigned Zero permanent latrine duty. He let X off the hook though, after the android came in his office and protested against his own punishment, using the maverick hunter's monthly motto "never betray your allies" against him. The motto was changed the next day, even though it wasn't the beginning of a new month. X, however, was still not punished for anything Zero did. The blue android did, however, give Zero a knowing grin every time the reploid had to report for latrine duty. Eventually, Zero slyly replied that he'd get revenge for X's betrayal in leaving him to such a crappy job alone.

Remarkably, Zero's pranks the next week were not targeted at a specific unit, but rather X himself, which resulted in a prank war that lasted the rest of the month, before both maverick hunters were put on suspension for two months. X had been sent back to Cain's in order to "think about what he'd done". They were called back in the next week because of a shortage in available hunters and weren't "banished", as Zero so liked to put it, again.

Zero was still on permanent latrine duty and X was tasked with joining him at random times of the month.

Which explained why the two of them were in the bathroom, singing songs nearly a century old as they performed various duties.

"But she said, where'd you wanna go," Zero sang, using an empty toilet paper roll as a microphone. X was sure that if people's original understanding of the maverick hunter hadn't been shot, shredded, and burned yet, it would be now.

The android was sure that he would get weird looks for any passersbys but joined in anyways. He really had nothing to lose. All of the dorms thought he was a mass murderer anyways.

"How much you wanna risk!"

"I'm not looking for somebody with some superhuman gifts!" Zero belted, sliding out of the bathroom stall on his knees. He was, amazingly, not in his armor for once, not wanting to get the metal tainted with anything foul.

"Some superhero," X added, straining to wipe the mirror; he was too short to reach.

"Some fairy tale bliss!" Zero walked over to the mirror and lifted X onto his shoulders so that the android could reach.

"Just something I can turn to!" X, with Zero's help, managed to clean the spots that he was unable to before.

"Somebody I can kiss!" Zero finished and if anybody walked in to see a blue shirted reploid still on the shoulders of a red shirted one with insanely long hair and singing to the lyrics of "Something just like this", they were either too stunned to comment, or decided that they were going to try a different restroom instead.

"I want something just like this!" somebody yelled from outside the restroom. Zero raced to poke his head out the restroom door. X yelped. He was still on the reploid's shoulders.

"WHO EVER THAT WAS, I FREAKING LOVE YOU! YOU DON'T KNOW HOW LONG I'VE BEEN WAITING FOR SOMEBODY TO JOIN IN!" Zero screamed. X chuckled.

"ZERO! GET BACK TO WORK!" Sigma's voice shouted from the other side of the office. X's chuckled morphed to full on laughter.

"MAKE ME!" Zero screamed. He then looked up at X. "We had just finished right?"

X nodded and leapt down from the reploid's shoulders.

"I mean, the cleaning supplies are still in there, but otherwise, yes," he replied.

"Leave the supplies then! Let's go! We need to book it before the mean green machine gets over here!" Zero exclaimed and ended up having to drag X away because the android was laughing too hard. Onlookers merely watched in confusion. They didn't understand.

* * *

Sigma eventually found the two in a _bowling_ alley of all places nearly twelve hours later, eating pizza and starting on their twentieth game. He started to lecture them about responsibilities and scolding them about what could have happened in case of an emergency. Both maverick hunters pointed first to their armor, which they were wearing, the ride chasers outside, and the communicators on their belts, both online and functional.

"We told the secretary where we were going and also, we're taking vacation time, of which we are fully obligated to take and we prepared for not only communication but quick transportation too. Not to mention that we're also strategically positioned in the city that should an emergency happen, we'd be able to get there before anybody from base could," X started.

"Also, we finished latrine duty soooooooooooo . . . wanna join this game?" Zero asked. Sigma merely held a hand up to his forehead and rubbed it. He left almost immediately after, grumbling about blue androids corrupting perfectly good soldiers. Both Zero and X just shrugged and returned to their twentieth game.

* * *

Zero muttered stream after stream of curses as the icy cold wind tore into his face. He wasn't cold. No. He refused to be cold. Because that would just give the shitty Commander the satisfaction that he had managed to finally give the reploid a suitable punishment. Although, he was still cranky that he- _they-_ were being punished for this at _all_.

His joints were stiff, nearly frozen, and his hair was no longer free flowing, instead a solid mess of matted hair and ice. Not to mention that they'd been walking through waist deep snow for hours because _apparently_ there hadn't been any available Ride Chasers.

Zero growled audibly and cursed at the reploid responsible for his situation. This mission was shitty. Sigma was a complete asshole and _that_ was saying something, coming from him. He screamed in frustration as another blast of icy wind sent a face full of snow his direction. It was freaking _cold_ , dammit!

He glanced over his shoulder to his companion, partially satisfied to see that the android was just as miserable as he was. _This was ridiculous_ , he growled to himself. They were _robots; they shouldn't be getting this cold._ But they were and their systems and joints were sluggish as a result. X was faring slightly better than Zero, but was still far more sluggish than he normally was.

Their mission was simple. Go to a military base in Greenland in the middle of _winter_ and respond to a maverick report that came in earlier in the week. They got a ride to Greenland, but had to be dropped off several miles away because of the winds.

Honestly, the entire situation pissed him off. _Why_ were they only responding to the call _now_? Why not _right when they got it_? And why the hell were they _walking_ there when a maverick could be attacking _right now_? If Zero got to the base and found out that there actually wasn't a maverick, heads would roll. He was _going_ to actually _kill_ Sigma.

X chuckled, amused, at Zero's bad mood. His hearing was sharp enough to pick up the multitude of death threats that Zero breathed against Sigma. Sure, he wasn't happy with the situation either, but he understood where the Commander had been coming from. The two of them _had_ been getting a little bit too comfortable with the way things were run at base. As a result, they'd been doing a few things that while fun, were also incredibly ridiculous and unprofessional. X still thought his actions were justified, because nobody really wanted to join an organization that had a high mortality rate. Maverick hunting had become such a depressing topic over the last few months that there needed to be _something_ that kept people from see the world as a lost cause. Sure, he knew that there were limits to what you could and couldn't do, endangering the security of a mission was one of them, but both he and Zero made sure to never cross that line. It seemed though, that the Commander, for all his tactical understanding, didn't quite understand the mental structures of his own troops and therefore saw his and mostly Zero's actions as childish and completely unnecessary.

Still, the Commander did know how to plan an extensive and almost fool proof strategy. In fact, both Zero and X idolized him for it. X chuckled at the thought. It was ironic how Zero was now cursing out the commander's name right now when he had been gushing over one of the reploid's battle plans earlier that day. X was sure it had to do partially with the fact that the blonde haired maverick hunter could not participate in the battle plan because of this very mission.

X sighed as he thought. Even still, Sigma just didn't get that _because_ Zero's social processing skills were so skewed, Zero fully believed that pranking was a good way to get people to lighten up. Because apparently he knew that even _he_ had been incredibly tense before he met X, and since then was starting to see the world in more than just black and white.

Really Zero was just a child, desperately wanting to impress its less than appreciative parent. In contrast, the blonde haired reploid was practically an old man with how experienced and knowledgeable he was on the battle field.

X wondered if Zero knew just how human he actually was. People always commented about how human _X_ seemed and most seemed to think that Zero was some demon spawned from hell. But nobody cared enough to realize that while the two were specialized in two entirely different fields, they still acted far more human than most reploids _because_ of that. And because they could learn. People could be so knowledgeable about one thing and then completely ignorant about another. They were just raised differently. It was as simple as that. That was the only thing, X believed, that made him so different from Zero. Zero's originally faulty social processor was no longer as faulty. It had developed far faster than any reploid X had worked with. Perhaps that was partially because Zero was so bad at understanding people in the first place and had so much to improve on, but even still, with reploids there was always an underlying tone of artificial feelings. With Zero? That sense that told him that Zero wasn't human purely because of the way he spoke had been quiet for months now.

And while X understood people on a more emotional level, Zero could sometimes recognize the potential in people far faster than X could, often in people that X hadn't even considered for the job. Sometimes X's emotions got in the way, and while this didn't present to be too much of a problem, Zero was always around to pull X into line and get him refocused on what really mattered. Similarly, X prevented Zero from becoming a heartless jerk, as he commonly was before he met the android. The blonde was often still snappy, especially when dealing with commanding officers other than Sigma.

X paused in his mental ramblings as Zero let out a cry of joy. The base they came to investigate was finally visible and the blonde reploid started running, armor squeaking in protest. X began running as well, if only so that he could be there to keep Zero restrained when they finally got to the base. He had a feeling that this whole mission was a wild goose chase anyways.

His suspicions were confirmed later on and he ended up having to _teleport_ a bloodthirsty Zero out of the base. Sigma was lucky that he wasn't around when they got back, because Zero was livid and an angry Zero could have been almost as bad as a maverick one if X hadn't been around to stem off most of the anger.

 **Author's Note:**

 **Sooooooooo, I lost the flash drive that this file was on. And then found it again, a month later, hooked up to the computer I use for writing music. It was on my _desk_ the _entire time_. . . . I'd like to say that my desk is clean, but it's really not and that's probably why I lost it in a computer. . . .Also, I meant to add more to this chapter, but ultimately decided I'd already made you people suffer too much. **

_**Unless**_ **something changes, the next chapter is where we start delving into the good stuff. I just wanted to set up X's maverick hunter life a little bit more before I started the crazy Sigma goes maverick plot line. I meant to start that _this_ chapter, but somehow writing about X reflecting on his life for the last few months just before he dropped from the sky turned into a three thousand word description of Zero's pranking tendencies. . . . Not really sure what happened there. **


End file.
